Podcasts · Government · News

Divided Argument

Will Baude & Dan Epps

140 episodes

An unscheduled, unpredictable Supreme Court podcast. Hosted by Will Baude and Dan Epps. In partnership with SCOTUSblog.

Episodes page 1 of 3

  1. You Should See the Other Guy

    · 1 h 10 min · S7 E1

    Divided Argument — S7E1: Summary & Highlights One-line summary (Beamly) Season 7 opens with a Court busy not deciding: an Alito recusal, a quorum lost to four book deals, and a stern Purcell per curiam for Missouri.…

  2. Shoe of Damocles

    · 1 h 20 min · S6 E30

    We're back after a break, and the August interim docket handed us two per curiam standing rulings. In Trump v. California, the Court stayed the injunction against the mail-ballot executive order because the states'…

  3. A Thriving Atrocities Practice

    · 1 h 15 min · S6 E29

    After following up on Justice Alito's summer interview, the new birthright-citizenship executive orders, and the Court's record-low approval numbers, we devote the episode to Cisco Systems v. Doe, the Falun Gong…

  4. Very Civilized Orangutans

    · 1 h 09 min · S6 E28

    We squeeze in one more episode before Will's vacation, tying the single-season record in the process. The mailbag then demands a reckoning on whether Magneto's powers are really limited to ferrous metals, along with…

  5. Ice by Magneto

    · 1 h 04 min · S6 E27

    We're back — maybe getting a little too scheduled — with one opinion on the docket: West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Little v. Hecox, where the Court held that states may limit girls' and women's sports teams to biological…

  6. The Based Direction

    · 55 min · S6 E26

    We're back from vacation and chipping away at the summer backlog. Before the substance: listeners weigh in on our AI-generated cover art, Claude's new prediction scorecard grades our respective forecasting records, and…

  7. Norway-Sweden Worshippers

    · 1 h 30 min · S6 E25

    We picked two immigration decisions from the same day over the transgender-sports case because — Dan’s protests notwithstanding — that’s where the interesting law is. In Mullin v. Doe the Court lets the administration…

  8. Smart Microwave

    · 1 h 25 min · S6 E24

    After a quick check on the Nina Totenberg embargo kerfuffle and one more revelation from Justice Thomas's memoir, we devote the episode to Chatrie v. United States, the Court's first major Fourth Amendment decision in…

  9. Weird Islands

    · 1 h 15 min · S6 E23

    It's the last opinion day of the term, and the big one landed: Trump v. Barbara, the birthright-citizenship case. We read the majority as the rare easy case and spend most of the episode on why the four dissents each…

  10. Always Already

    · 1 h 13 min · S6 E22

    The big opinions are coming fast and furious as the Term ends. This episode, we take on two related cases from the penultimate opinion drop day: Trump v. Slaughter, which overrules Humphrey's Executor and clears away…

  11. Mechanical / Animal

    · 56 min · S6 E21

    We're in triage mode as the Court clears its end-of-term backlog. We run through the week's opinion dump before focusing on two cases that look unrelated but turn on the same question: when may a state rewrite…

  12. Alcoholic Originalism

    · 1 h 03 min · S6 E20

    The big opinions are starting to drop, and we're doing our best to keep pace. We first discuss Landor v. Louisiana Department of Corrections, which concerns religious liberty, the scope of Congress's power to create…

  13. Watch Snobs

    · 1 h 17 min · S6 E19

    We open with the usual grab bag—the "foot fault" pun buried in a Justice Thomas opinion, reading Justice Alito's clerk-hiring tea leaves, and a detour into the metaphysics of conditional resignations and whether you…

  14. Impregnable Citadel of Technicality

    · 1 h 13 min · S6 E18

    After puzzling over an interesting follow-up question about Pitchford v. Cain, we unpack a summary vacatur in Whitton v. Dixon. We then spend a while breaking down the latest developments in Allen v. Milligan line, in…

  15. Smooth Stone in the River

    · 1 h 11 min · S6 E17

    The Court has been busy, and we somehow manage to cover a number of developments with unpredictable efficiency. We talk about the Court's latest summary reversal on the "party presentation principle"; Justice…

  16. Ninja Court Packing

    · 1 h 09 min · S6 E16

    We are joined by guest co-host Professor Pam Karlan at the American Law Institute Annual Meeting for the last live show of season 6. We work through a busy stretch of the interim docket: the Alabama GVR in Allen v.…

  17. Majordoma

    · 1 h 01 min · S6 E15

    The Court’s latest Voting Rights Act decision, Louisiana v. Callais, narrows Section 2 in a way that could reshape redistricting, weaken majority-minority districts, and intensify the fight over how race and…

  18. Even Eve-ier

    · 1 h 01 min · S6 E14

    A deep dive into the latest Supreme Court news, a couple of unusual shadow docket rulings, and a cross-ideological merits decision that raises classic questions about federal power, preemption, and how much weight…

  19. Backup backup backup backup argument

    · 1 h 18 min · S6 E13

    We recap and reflect on the oral arguments in Trump v. Barbara (the birthright citizenship case) and then analyze the Court's recent decision in Chiles v. Salazar, about the First Amendment limits on Colorado's…

  20. Jezebel Shouting

    · 38 min · S6 E12

    We're live at WashU Law's Admitted Students Day! After catching up on some shadow docket activity, we dig into Olivier v. City of Brandon, the Court's unanimous March 2026 decision by Justice Kagan. A Mississippi…

  21. A Subversive Mission

    · 51 min · S6 E11

    We announce an exciting new partnership with SCOTUSblog and introduce the show to new listeners. We then return to the mysterious origins of the Chief Justice's "no, no, a thousand times no," debate the Court's new…

  22. Cruel and Unusual and Stupid

    · 48 min · S6 E10

    It's our live show at the University of Chicago! Hosted by the University of Chicago Federalist Society, we discuss this week's big shadow-docket rulings about gender transitions in California Schools (Mirabelli v.…

  23. Betty Boop or Shakespeare

    · 1 h 26 min · S6 E9

    With unpredictable timeliness, we have a quasi-emergency episode on the 170-page tariffs decision, Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump. Come for the in-the-weeds legal analysis, stay for the deep dive into the origins of…

  24. Ayn Rand Graffiti

    · 57 min · S6 E8

    We're back for another live show at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, hosted by the Northwestern Federalist Society! We discuss the term's two Second Amendment arguments -- first recapping the oral argument in…

  25. Bok Choy

    · 47 min · S6 E7

    With shocking and uncharacteristic efficiency, we manage to discuss three merits opinions and one orders list dissent in only 47 minutes. Specifically, we revisit Coney Island Auto Parts Unlimited, Inc. v. Burton (time…

  26. Lake Shrimp

    · 54 min · S6 E6

    We didn't get the tariffs decision this week, but we discuss two of the opinions we did get -- Bost v. Illinois Board of Elections, a decision about standing and election law, and Case v. Montana, a rare Fourth…

  27. The Marshal and the Margarine

    · 1 h 19 min · S6 E5

    We're back with the first episode of the new year, breaking down the interim docket opinion/order in Trump v. Illinois, the national guard case, after first warming up with new Erie scholarship, state criminal…

  28. Non-Cake Physical Object

    · 1 h 17 min · S6 E4

    We're back to break down a month's worth of shadow docket activity -- three recent summary reversals, plus the stay in the Texas gerrymandering case (Abbott v. LULAC). We also discuss the launch of the SCOTUSblog…

  29. Counter-Counter-Counter-Designations

    · 55 min · S6 E3

    Will and Dan record a rare live show in an unusual venue: the Salamander Resort in Middleburg, Virginia, at the annual attorney retreat for trial boutique Wilkinson Stekloff. Dan teaches Will some of the new lingo he's…

  30. Proximity Mines in the Facility

    · 1 h 18 min · S6 E2

    After a predictably unpredictable set of detours through Latin grammar, parenting philosophies, and 90s video games, we catch up on the latest shadow (interim?) docket activity and recap the oral argument in the…

  31. Crazy Half-Drunk Unreliable Research Assistant

    · 1 h 04 min · S6 E1

    Divided Argument is in its sixth season! Our first episode of the term focuses, of course, on the latest developments on the shadow docket. These include several grants of interim relief to the Trump administration, as…

  32. Proust or Plato

    · 53 min · S5 E28

    For the season finale, we're joined by Yale law professor Justin Driver to talk about his new book, "The Fall of Affirmative Action: Race, the Supreme Court, and the Future of Higher Education." We discuss the…

  33. Byzantine Wall

    · 1 h 17 min · S5 E27

    We extend our record-breaking run with a discussion of the Court's two big recent emergency docket rulings: Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo and NIH v. American Public Health Association.

  34. Bedrock Con Law 101

    · 1 h 07 min · S5 E26

    We're joined by Michigan law professor Richard Primus to talk about his new book, "The Oldest Constitutional Question: Enumerated and Federal Power." Richard describes one of the the most widespread beliefs about…

  35. Originalism Hulk

    · 1 h 27 min · S5 E25

    Continuing our long slog through the end-of-Term opinion dump, it's fraud day! We dig into Kousisis v. United States and Thompson v. United States, two interesting federal criminal law puzzles.

  36. The Country of the Future

    · 1 h 31 min · S5 E24

    We finally circle back to the two big structural constitutional law cases from the last day of the term. First is Kennedy v. Braidwood Management, which upheld the appointment structure of the U.S. Preventative…

  37. The Thunder Docket

    · 31 min · S5 E23

    Acting with unpredictable alacrity and unpredictable brevity, we break down the Supreme Court's recent interim order in Trump v. Boyle, and discuss what it means for the unitary executive, and for the shadow docket. We…

  38. Snake-Charmer-Specific

    · 1 h 04 min · S5 E22

    Moving with shockingly unpredictable efficiency, we respond to feedback, debate which of us is more composting-friendly, catch up on the emergency docket, and chip away at our end-of-Term backlog by digging into…

  39. Didactic and Inculcatory

    · 1 h 29 min · S5 E21

    We look at the final orders list before summer break, and then continue to work through last month's opinions, this time with an extended analysis of two decisions about children and culture wars -- Mahmoud v. Taylor…

  40. Schrödinger's Innocence Right

    · 1 h 17 min · S5 E20

    We talk a bit more about Trump v. CASA, revisit the usage of "general," answer some voicemails, and then turn to Gutierrez v. Saenz, a procedural tangle about whether a death row inmate can sue a state prosecutor over…

  41. Why Are We Here?

    · 1 h 12 min · S5 E19

    We celebrate the 100th episode of the podcast with a special cross-over episode with Sarah Isgur at Advisory Opinions! Sarah, Will, and Dan break down today's blockbuster decision in Trump v. CASA, forbidding universal…

  42. Loose Signification

    · 1 h 02 min · S5 E18

    We're joined by a special guest, Harvard Law Professor Stephen Sachs, to talk about Fuld v. Palestine Liberation Organization. Fuld is last week's big personal jurisdiction case, where the Court upheld federal laws…

  43. Caesar's Face

    · 1 h 04 min · S5 E17

    After some feedback and further thoughts on our Skrmetti episode and a shocking revelation about "LabCorp," we circle back to an earlier June opinion about religious distinctions, Catholic Charities Bureau v. Wisconsin…

  44. Low Horse

    · 1 h 13 min · S5 E16

    Without much introductory ado, we interrupt Will's vacation to give you a thorough breakdown of United States v. Skrmetti, the trans health care case that is one of the most-watched cases of the term.

  45. Truth and Reconciliation

    · 57 min · S5 E15

    We start out by debating who's responsible for Dan's audio snafus last time before digging into a various odds and ends, such as the Chief Justice's toast at the Supreme Court Historical Society dinner and President…

  46. Delete This. Call Me.

    · 1 h 19 min · S5 E14

    With apologies for Dan's horrendous audio quality: we catch up on the latest emergency-docket happenings and debate whether Trump v. Wilcox is a big deal or small potatoes. We also catch up on listener feedback and,…

  47. Gorsuch Genie

    · 1 h 07 min · S5 E13

    We're joined by NYU law professor Rachel Barkow to talk about her new book Justice Abandoned: How the Supreme Court Ignored the Constitution and Enabled Mass Incarceration. Listen to learn about five (or six) Supreme…

  48. Friends with Oprah Winfrey

    · 49 min · S5 E12 · Explicit

    We're back with another unexpectedly short and timely episode, focusing on last Friday's emergency docket decision in AARP v. Trump. We also spend a few minutes on a few other orders: the administration's partial…

  49. A Trees Guy in a Forest Court

    · 1 h 01 min · S5 E11

    We reflect on the death of Justice Souter and sort out some loose ends from the last episode. We then dig into the Court's only opinion from Thursday, Barnes v. Felix, which we previewed with friend of the show Orin…

  50. Moot, Wrong, and Irrelevant

    · 1 h 10 min · S5 E10

    The shadow docket strikes once again! We break down the Court's unusual immigration ruling in AARP v. Trump (no, not that AARP!), and then briefly discuss the much-heralded ERISA case (Cunningham v. Cornell). But first…

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