Donald Trump’s impeachment trial is already unfolding as a Mitch McConnell-coordinated farce. The charges against Trump are serious, but they beg the question of why Congress has never impeached a president for war crimes. None of the three Senate trials of a president was for imperial crimes committed in plain sight, despite a long history of presidents invading countries, killing civilians, and torturing prisoners.Constitutional and international law scholar Marjorie Cohn discusses the trial of Trump, the refusal of lawmakers to prosecute war crimes, and presents the case that Trump should be impeached for assassinating Iranian Gen. Qassim Suleimani in Baghdad.This month marks 29 straight years that the US has been bombing Iraq. Joe Biden, who proactively aided and abetted the Bush administration’s drive for war, has been openly lying about his record, but Bernie Sanders also has some serious questions he needs to answer about his own support for regime change, missile strikes, and deadly economic sanctions. Jeremy Scahill and Sam Husseini, of the Institute for Public Accuracy, present a thorough history of both candidates records on Iraq over the past three decades. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jeremy Scahill hosts a live discussion in New York on the unfolding crisis with Intercept senior columnist Mehdi Hasan, reporter Murtaza Hussain, national security editor Vanessa Gezari, and senior news editor Ali Gharib. They discuss what the latest developments mean for Iran and the U.S. and how tensions have rapidly escalated since Donald Trump came to office. Will Trump’s current posture hold, or will he order more violence? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Other podcasts make money from advertising and corporate sponsors. We don’t have ads — Intercepted is powered by its members.When you support Intercepted, you become a part of the journalism that holds the powerful to account. Become a member — together we can make a difference.If you become a sustaining member at $10/month, we’ll send you our stylish Intercepted t-shirt.This is a community effort. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a difference. Generous support of listeners like you is what makes our fierce and independent reporting possible.Do what you can. Become a member at theintercept.com/support. All donations are welcome. You can make a one-time gift or become a sustaining member.Thank you! We’ll see you in 2020. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Former senior health insurance executive-turned-whistleblower Wendell Potter explains McKinsey’s role in our insurance nightmare and how Pete Buttigieg is using industry talking points to attack Medicare for All. Potter also discusses his career working for insurance giants, soaring medical costs in the U.S. and his role in killing Hillary Clinton’s health care initiative in the 1990s.Propublica reporter Ian MacDougall discusses McKinsey’s relationship with the Saudi regime, its work for Rikers island, and how it helped push opioids to doctors and patients. MacDougall also lays out his reporting on how McKinsey’s work for ICE in detaining and deporting immigrants disturbed career immigration officials.And, the Justice Department’s Inspector General blasted the FBI over its lies and omissions in obtaining a secret FISA warrant to spy on Trump campaign operative Carter Page. Intercept co-founder Glenn Greenwald discusses how the report vindicates civil liberties activists and serves as a striking rebuke of the bipartisan love affair with law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Monday marked the five year anniversary of the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s executive summary on the CIA’s torture program. The former top Senate Intelligence Committee investigator, Daniel Jones and his team combed through 6.3 million pages of CIA records. Jones discusses the years-long battle with the Bush and Obama administrations to make public the findings of this still-classified 7,000 page report. In this bonus episode, Jones expands on the torture report findings.  Jones is the subject of the new feature film, The Report, starring Adam Driver and Annette Bening, and the host of its companion podcast, The Report Podcast, with Kelly McEvers, where they unpack the story of the CIA’s torture program, the Senate’s investigation, and ensuing cover-up. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As Washington D.C. remains focused on the Trump impeachment, Daniel Jones, the former top Senate Intelligence Committee investigator into the CIA torture program discusses the years-long battle with the Bush and Obama administrations to make public the findings of his still-classified 7,000 page report. Jones, the subject of the new feature film, The Report, starring Adam Driver and Annette Bening, discusses his findings. He tells the story of how the CIA, under John Brennan, spied on the Senate investigators and accessed their classified computers.As a rebellion in Iraq forces the resignation of the country’s prime minister, Iraqi activist Raed Jarrar describes the roots of the protests, the impact of foreign intervention by numerous countries, and the history of the U.S. encouraging sectarianism in Iraq.Plus, "Bigger Than Baghdad" — we hear new music from Iraqi-Canadian hip-hop artist Narcy about the protests in Iraq. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Other podcasts make money from advertising and corporate sponsors. We don’t have ads — Intercepted is powered by its members.All donations are welcome. You can make a one-time gift or become a sustaining member.  If you become a sustaining member at $10/month, we’ll send you our stylish Intercepted t-shirt.This is a community effort. Your donation, no matter the amount, makes a difference. Generous support of listeners like you is what makes our fierce and independent reporting possible.Do what you can. Become a member at theintercept.com/support.Thank you! We’ll be back tomorrow with a full show. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jeffrey Sterling was indicted in 2010 on charges under the Espionage Act for allegedly leaking sensitive national security information to then-New York Times reporter James Risen. Sterling discusses his time as a CIA case officer and how his internal complaint about Operation Merlin, a half-baked CIA scheme that had tried to disrupt Iran’s nuclear weapons development, led to his firing. Sterling explains the discrimination suit he filed against the CIA and how there is no evidence that he was the source for Risen, who is now The Intercept's senior national security correspondent. Sterling also shares what it was like to be charged under the Espionage Act and comments on the appalling hostility toward whistleblowers in the U.S. Sterling’s new book is “Unwanted Spy: The Persecution of an American Whistleblower.” Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Iranian-American author and analyst Hooman Majd discusses a century of history marked by intervention and threats from major world powers. Beginning with Britain, Russia, and Germany battling for control of Iran’s oil, Majd and Jeremy Scahill discuss the CIA coup against Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953, the Islamic revolution, and the seizure of the U.S. embassy in Tehran in 1979 and how Washington has repeatedly tried to bring down the government of the Islamic Republic. The Intercept’s investigative series The Iran Cables offers historical insight into Iran’s operations in neighboring Iraq, which are informed by the bloody history of the Iran-Iraq War, the U.S. invasion, subsequent occupation, and the shattering of Iraqi society. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Early Monday morning, a few minutes past midnight, The Intercept published a major series of investigative stories based on a cache of more than 700 pages of secret Iranian intelligence files detailing years of “painstaking work by Iranian spies to co-opt the country’s leaders, pay Iraqi agents working for the Americans to switch sides, and infiltrate every aspect of Iraq’s political, economic, and religious life.” On this special episode of Intercepted: The Intercept’s Murtaza Hussein and New York Times reporter Farnaz Fassihi discuss the revelations.The leak of these files is historic. The Iran Cables paint a picture of the actions of a rational nation state actor’s intervention in the affairs of a neighbor whose government once launched a devastating war against it with the backing of the world’s preeminent superpower, the U.S. For more than six decades, successive U.S. governments have waged military and economic war on Iran and Iraq. In the post-9/11 world, the U.S. overthrew the governments of two of Iran’s most threatening neighbors, Saddam Hussein and the Taliban, while simultaneously coming dangerously close to an all out regime change war against Iran. The 2003 invasion shattered Iraq and the documents in the Iran Cables tell the story of the secret activities of its neighbor Iran. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.