By now you've probably heard of the family separation crisis at the US-Mexico border. What you may not know is how exactly we got to this tipping point. On today's show we talk with Appeal writer Max Rivlin-Nadler, who's been following President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions's ramped up "zero tolerance" approach to immigration. While President Obama had harsh immigration policies as well, Trump's approach goes much further––animated by a toxic mixture of racism, for-profit incarceration, and summary punishment.

Episode 8: The Racist Zeal of 'Zero Tolerance' and Trump's Anti-Immigrant Escalation

State child protective courts are an under-reported element of our criminal legal system, but their impact on communities of color and the poor is felt as much, if not more, than other aspects of it. One case, that of the Hart family, caught national attention after a seemingly "normal" white couple adopted African-American children taken from the mother by a corrupt and likely racist judge in Texas––only to end in a grisly murder-suicide. Our guest, Appeal contributor Roxanna Asgarian, joins us to talk about this case and the broader social and racial aspects of the state taking children away from their parents.

Episode 10: Race and Corruption in Child Protection Courts

Shoplifting is traditionally seen as a petty crime unworthy of serious punishment, much less prison time. But under an increasingly popular theory of crime, DA's––with the help of retail lobbyists––are throwing the book at people for stealing as little as $39 worth of goods, claiming they burgled a public store. Our guest, Appeal contributor Jessica Pishko, discusses this punitive trend and what public defenders are doing to push back.

Episode 11: Big Box Retailers and Prosecutors Team Up to Crackdown on Petty Crime

As prison reform efforts begin to reduce the number of people behind bars, electronic monitoring is becoming a popular “alternative” to incarceration. Our guest, Appeal contributor Kira Lerner, talks about the moral hazards presented by this approach and why it’s important that prison reform efforts expand beyond cement walls to address house arrest and monitoring technologies.

Episode 12: When Electronic Cages Replace Steel and Cement

“He was a straight-A student,” “a loving husband,” “she worked 60 hours a week”—we often hear that victims of police and white supremacist violence didn’t deserve to be killed because they were good people, not simply because they were people. Our guest, Appeal contributor Zoé Samudzi, argues that the notion of “innocence” as a condition for empathy is an outdated, puritan mode of thinking that implies those with messy, so-called “criminal pasts” are somehow not deserving of our compassion.

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