Juana Summers
Appearances
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Ranjani Sreenivasan is a 37-year-old architect who was set to finish a doctoral program at Columbia in May when she was notified that her visa had been revoked. She told NPR's Here and Now that the Department of Homeland Security is accusing her of advocating for violence and terrorism. She'd attended a handful of protests against killings of civilians in the war between Israel and Hamas.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Rather than risk arrest, she fled to Canada.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Consider this. The Trump administration's efforts to deport foreign-born students have set off alarm bells about where and when the First Amendment is applied. But it's not the first time our government has tried to deport student activists for pro-Palestinian speech. Almost 40 years ago, it tried to do the same thing on different legal grounds.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Coming up, we'll hear from a lawyer who defended those students about what's at stake. From NPR, I'm Juana Summers. It's Consider This from NPR. One morning in January of 1987, Michel Shahada, a Palestinian man who'd lawfully emigrated to the United States as a teenager, was taking care of his toddler son at home when federal agents arrived at his door and arrested him at gunpoint.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
That's Nora Abdallah speaking with NPR. Her husband, Columbia graduate student and legal U.S. resident Mahmoud Khalil, was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on the evening of March 8th.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Shahada soon learned he was one of eight immigrants, mostly students and known as the L.A.A. arrested on charges relating to their pro-Palestinian activism. Fast forward to this month, when federal agents arrested Mahmoud Khalil, a recent Columbia University graduate student, and Georgetown professor Badar Kansouri. Like the LA8, both are in the U.S.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
legally being threatened with deportation, and both are targets of the Trump administration's crackdown on what they describe as anti-Semitic pro-Hamas speech on college campuses across the country. For insight into this moment and what we can learn from the plight of the LA-8, we turn now to David Cole. He represented the LA-8 over their 20-year fight to remain in the United States.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
David Cole, welcome to the program.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
I just want to start by asking you, as briefly as you can, could you just walk us through what happened to the LA-8?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
As you mentioned, these cases went on for more than two decades. How did that affect the lives of the L.A. families?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
What are the similarities that you see between their case and those that are being brought today against Mahmoud Khalil and the others?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Khalil was taken to a detention facility in Louisiana and has been there since. He has not been charged with a crime. The government has instead accused him of being a Hamas sympathizer, a claim his wife vehemently denies.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Why do you think it is that the government has gone after folks on college campuses in particular when it comes to this kind of speech?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
In order to pursue these deportations, the government is using a rarely invoked part of the Immigration and Nationality Act that allows the U.S. Secretary of State to deport any non-citizen whose presence in the U.S. could be deemed to have, and I'm quoting here, adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has made the claim that, Khalil's case at least, It's not about free speech, but it's about who is and who is not allowed to be in the country to begin with. What do you make of that argument?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
The use of this obscure legal provision, to me, it seems really similar to what happened with the LA-8. How might you counter such an argument in a case like this?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
If the government is successful in deporting someone like Khalil or Badr Khonsuri, what kind of ripple effects might that have for free speech in the United States?
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
was not right. Since his arrest, the government has also alleged in a court document that he failed to disclose some of his employment history in his application for a green card. And Mahmoud Khalil is not the only Columbia student for whom federal agents have come knocking.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
David Cole is a former lawyer for the LA8 and National Legal Director for the ACLU. He is now at Georgetown Law. David, thank you so much for talking with us.
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Campus protesters have faced deportation threats before
This episode was produced by Kira Wakeem with audio engineering by Hannah Glovna. It was edited by Sarah Handel and Nadia Lancey. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
Heckling a president during a speech isn't new. What was unprecedented Tuesday night as President Trump addressed the nation in a joint session of Congress was a lawmaker being escorted out for such heckling. We won the popular vote by big numbers and won counties in our country.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
For their response to Trump's address, Democrats chose a senator who won last November in a state that Trump carried. Alyssa Slotkin is a centrist from Michigan. She framed Trump's agenda as an attack on the middle class.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
But she also said Republicans and Democrats should work together to fix America's immigration system. She cited Ronald Reagan approvingly. And even agreed with Trump that the government should run more efficiently, though she strongly criticized his, quote, chaotic approach. It was a speech aimed squarely at moderates.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
Consider this. Democratic moderates think they have an answer for Trump 2.0. What does their playbook look like? From NPR, I'm Juana Summers.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
Texas Democratic Representative Al Green stood up after Trump said voters gave them a mandate when they elected him last fall. Green waved his cane as he yelled at the president. You don't have a mandate to cut Medicaid. House Speaker Mike Johnson gave warnings.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
The End It's Consider This from NPR. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries acknowledged last month that Democrats don't have much power.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
So as they think about how to try to push back on Trump, Democrats are also thinking about how to win the next election. What's the case they want to make? That's a question that Matt Bennett and his fellow moderate Democrats tried to answer at a recent retreat. Bennett is the executive vice president for public affairs at Third Way. That's a centrist Democratic think tank.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
When I spoke to him earlier today, I asked him if he thought that Democrats' protests during the joint address were effective.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
I want to turn now to the retreat that you helped organize in February. You got a group of moderate Democrats together for a day and a half. And I understand that was a group that included some elected officials, consultants, folks who worked on campaigns and a couple of words. What was the vibe like?
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
Give us a sampling of what some of those conversations were like among you and your fellow Democrats.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
I've heard you say several times that your party appears to have lost the battle for reasonableness. How does it win it back?
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
And when that didn't work, Green was removed from the House chamber.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
At the same time, we have noted that you come from a more moderate perspective. There are progressives in your party who might disagree with some of what you've said. I want to play you a cut of tape. It is from Virginia's Democratic Senator Tim Kaine. He spoke to my colleague Michelle Martin this morning.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
Matt Bennett, it's sort of a funny line, but I do kind of wonder, can the party marshal the discipline to reach out to voters with a unified message?
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
That was Matt Bennett. He's the executive vice president for public affairs at Third Way. Matt, thank you.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
This was one of several ways Democrats protested the president's speech last night. They also held signs throughout the speech with phrases like that's a lie or Musk steals. Many wore pink to try to make a statement. Some walked out during the speech. Others skipped the event altogether.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
This episode was produced by Alejandra Marquez-Hance, Connor Donovan, and Jeffrey Pierre. It was edited by Courtney Dorning. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.
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Can democrats find their way out of the wilderness?
This has been some Democrats approach to Trump's first six weeks in office as he's aimed to slash the federal workforce, tested the separation of powers and reshaped the global order. Democrats don't control any of the levers of power, so they protest. But we also saw a different approach Tuesday night.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
President Donald Trump has had his eye on Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, since his first term. Trump says he wants the island for national security purposes. He and his allies point to Greenland's strategic location, as well as its reserves of rare earth minerals.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
That's Akaluk Linga, a former member of Greenland's parliament. He spent years fighting for Greenland's right to self-determination. He believes that Greenland's future must be tied to Denmark.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
The island relies on Denmark for defense and security, but Greenland could declare independence after a referendum. Jorgen Bosen is a Greenlandic fan of President Trump and had a hand in organizing an unofficial visit by Donald Trump Jr. in January. He welcomes more American involvement.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
The president's renewed interest has thrust the island and its roughly 57,000 residents into an intense geopolitical spotlight. Lila Sandgreen was born and raised in Alulisat, the small town that's one of Greenland's most popular tourist destinations. She and her husband run a tourism company there.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
Bosun said he hopes that Greenland will enter a free association agreement with the U.S., where the U.S. gives economic assistance and provides for Greenland's defense. Consider this. It's not yet clear what shape, if any, Trump's ambitions for Greenland will take. But some politicians in the territory are taking his calls for acquisition more seriously than ever before.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
From NPR, I'm Juana Summers. It's Consider This from NPR. President Trump's calls for the U.S. to take over Greenland have sparked alarm and outrage. Denmark, which is responsible for Greenland's security, recently announced that it would further boost its defense spending. Earlier this month, lawmakers on Capitol Hill held a hearing focused on Trump's ambitions.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
In Greenland, Naya Nathanielson was watching. She's running for parliament in next month's elections, and I met her at her office in Nuuk last week. On one wall next to her desk, a piece of art caught my eye. It's an illustration of the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, gavel in hand.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
On the lectern, the words, fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you. I started by asking Naya Nathanielson for her reaction when she heard Trump's goal to take over her country. She learned about it when she saw a post from Trump's Truth Social platform.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
What was it about what he said and what he's been saying that made you take it more seriously?
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
I don't know how much of that Senate hearing you were able to see or digest, but what do you make of some of the arguments coming out of the states? There are a number of bills moving through our government suggesting authorizing President Trump to go into negotiations to purchase Greenland, of recent bills suggesting Greenland being renamed as red, white, and blue land.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
What do you think when you hear that?
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
I think if President Trump or a member of his administration or an ally were sitting here, they'd make the case that the interest that the U.S. has in Greenland is rooted in Arctic security and the strategic location of this island. What do you make of the security-based argument? Of course, the countries have had relationships for a long time.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
The United States has had and still has a military base here. What do you make of that?
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
I'm curious, what kind of relationship would you like to see between our two countries moving forward? We have that long, that decades long history. What is a way that there could be a relationship between Greenland and the U.S. that benefits the Greenlandic people who live here? What would you say?
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
That notion that the people of Greenland don't want to be American and don't want to be Danish was one I heard over and over again on my recent reporting trip to the island. A recent poll from Danish and Greenlandic news outlets backs up that sentiment. It found that 85 percent of Greenlanders don't want to be part of the United States.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
You're saying we had a good relationship. We had good opinions. That is in the past tense. Can you just paint a picture for us of what this has done for you? For people here, for their views of Americans, for their views of the relationship with America?
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
That was Naya Nathanielson. She's running for parliament and has served as Minister of Business, Trade, Mineral Resources, Justice, and Gender Equality in the Greenlandic government. This episode was produced by Matt Ozog, Vincent Accovino, and Elena Burnett. It was edited by Ashley Brown, Courtney Dorning, and Nadia Lancey. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
This is Karen Kortzen. We met her in between appointments at the hair salon she opened six months ago in Alulisat.
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The view from Greenland: 'We don't want to be Americans'
Greenlandic and Danish leaders have also told the U.S. that the territory is not for sale. And former lawmakers agree.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
Farmers do not like uncertainty. They want to know the prices their crops would fetch before they plant them. And they want to know how much it'll cost to buy seeds and fertilizer and farm equipment. And they want to know they won't be hit by drought or bird flu. But right now, things are not certain in farm country.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
In North Dakota, where one in five jobs are tied to agriculture, more than 67 percent of the electorate voted for Trump. But consider this. So far, the Trump administration's agriculture policy and its signature economic policy have resulted in a condition that farmers try to avoid. Uncertainty. From NPR, I'm Juana Summers.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
It's Consider This from NPR. Farmers already worry about crop prices, the cost of farm supplies and extreme weather. Now the federal government is another big question mark. President Trump's trade war will shape where farmers can sell their crops. And the U.S. Department of Agriculture has paused reimbursements, cut programs and attempted to lay off staff.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
Justin Sherlock is a farmer, also president of the North Dakota Soybean Growers Association. As our colleague Kirk Sigler reported from North Dakota, his uncertainty is compounded by tariffs and when or if they take hold. President Trump's tariffs and tariff threats on foreign imports... have led to other countries retaliating with tariffs on American agricultural exports.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
We wanted to know more about the relationship between farmers and the federal government. So this week we called on Ann Veneman. She was President George W. Bush's Secretary of Agriculture. My co-host Ari Shapiro takes it from here.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
For a soybean farmer, that would make Canadian fertilizer more expensive to import and would result in millions of tons of soybeans not being sold and exported to China.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
That's Anne Veneman, who was Secretary of Agriculture under President George W. Bush, speaking with our co-host Ari Shapiro. We heard Secretary Veneman describe farming as an uncertain business. Uncertainty is also on the minds of economists at the Federal Reserve System, the country's central bank.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
The 12 regional banks that make up the Fed regularly study their local economies, very much including agricultural industries, and they publish their findings in a document called the Beige Book. And throughout the latest edition, there's that word again, uncertainty. Robert Smith and Waylon Wong of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money have our Beige Book report.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
In his speech to Congress, President Trump asked farmers to bear with him. His hope is that the American economy eventually adapts to unlock a bigger domestic market for farmers.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
This episode was produced by Michelle Aslam, Connor Donovan, and Mia Venkat. It was edited by Patrick Jaron Watanonan and Nadia Lancey, with help from NPR's Kirk Sigler and Eric Whitney. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.
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Farming is uncertain — a trade war makes it more so
Under the first Trump administration's trade war, the federal government paid out billions to keep farmers afloat, but their businesses are still recovering. And Justin Sherlock has crops to plant this spring.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
Like a lot of economists, Mark Zandi with Moody's Analytics thinks President Trump's across-the-board tariffs are a bad idea.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
He told NPR that if all of Trump's tariffs stay in effect...
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
He has factories in the U.S., but a lot of his work is done in Mexico. He expects the 25% tariff to eat into his budget, which means he's postponed a planned investment in new equipment at his American factories.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
And that is another cost of the continually evolving tariffs. Car's time.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
Consider this. Businesses have been optimistic about the economy under Trump. His chaotic tariff rollout threatens that. From NPR, I'm Juana Somers. It's Consider This from NPR. President Trump is not one to concede, well, just about anything. So it's notable that he made this acknowledgement when he talked about his tariff rollout and his joint address to Congress this week.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
For a second opinion on how little or not so little that disturbance will be, I spoke with Nick Bloom. He's an economist at Stanford University and the co-creator of the Economic Policy Uncertainty Index. Hi, Nick. Hey, thanks for having me on. Thanks for being here. OK, so if I can, I want to start with the tariffs on Mexico and Canada. It's been a bit of a roller coaster.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
We have seen them threatened, then delayed, then applied, then tweaked. And just setting aside the impact of the tariffs themselves for a moment, what is this kind of murkiness, this lack of clarity due to the economy?
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
Treasury Secretary Scott Bassett said on CBS News' Face the Nation that those fears were alarmist.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
And I would imagine similarly then for consumers, say, I want to buy a new house. I want to buy a new car, even a new computer. Similar effect. You're maybe going to sit and wait it out, right? Yeah.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
Robert Rubin, who was the U.S. Treasury Secretary under President Bill Clinton, said that this is the moment of greatest uncertainty that he'd seen in his six-decade career. So I want to ask you, Nick Bloom, how does that square with your measurement of uncertainty? Similar?
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
I mean, you and I have been talking about tariff policy, but I'm curious, is it just that? Or are there other areas with sort of big, blaring question marks that could be worrying for businesses?
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
Back when he was candidate Trump, he promised tax cuts and less regulation. And we know that those are things that business owners usually see as good for them. And surveys showed a whole lot of optimism from executives about the economy under a Trump presidency. So let me ask you this. Does the good still outweigh the bad from the business's point of view?
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
But Zandi says it's not just the tariffs themselves that are the problem, it's the uncertainty created by Trump's rollout. So just to recap, Trump threatened 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico would start in February. They were paused at the 11th hour only to eventually go into effect this week.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
That's Nick Bloom of Stanford University. Thank you.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
This episode was produced by Connor Donovan. It was edited by Courtney Dorning. And the story of the business owner at the top of this episode came from reporting by NPR's Scott Horsley. Our executive producer is Sammy Annigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
And then on Thursday, Trump announced the new tariffs would be paused for most products, but potentially only until April 2nd. Meanwhile, tariffs on China snapped into place in February and then doubled to 20%. What happens next is anyone's guess. And Zandi says that is bad for business.
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When it comes to the economy, it's all about uncertainty
And that is exactly where Randy Carr finds himself. He runs a business based in Florida that makes embroidered patches, you know, like you'd see on a uniform or a baseball cap.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
I don't know if you can hear the crowd got pretty excited.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
I mean, it's one of the most stunning places I've ever visited. It's this sort of scenic, beautiful tourist town. It's a place where lots of people go to set out and see the icebergs to take boat tours. All of the houses are super colored. There's beautiful snowscapes. And I think the thing that sticks with me is the fact that you can just hear the sled dogs howling all the time.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
Like even before you see them, you can hear them. And then when you see them, they're also pretty darn cute.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
So we did this story, and this is something I wouldn't have thought about before we started researching this trip, about the intersection of dog sledding and climate change. So we actually got to go out with this woman who's a dog sled musher named Stella. And when she took us out, she kind of warned us, you know, we don't have a lot of snow right now. It's actually pretty hot here.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
And when we don't have as much snow, it's harder for the dogs to pull. I think we've righted things. They're picking up speed again. And we're kind of looking out in front of us and you can see some snow. But there's like also these stretches of just sort of rough terrain. There are rocks and moss. We just went across a pretty big rock. It's kind of brown looking.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
One thing to know about traveling in Greenland is that there are not roads between the major towns and cities. So you've got to take these little small flights on Air Greenland to get from place to place.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
So we're seeing this in real time. And that is definitely the case when we took off on this dog sled. Like it just, there wasn't enough snow in some stretches, which meant that we were getting off the dog sled at times and running alongside of it.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
had you dog sledded before in your life uh nope how would you say you were as a dog sledder i mean i'm i would like to say that i'm very good at following directions um i think it helps that like you i'm a runner so running alongside of it i was definitely looking at my garment like man maybe i should have started my garment my heart rate is really up just get on easier said than done
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
Yeah, I think it touches every part of life there. When we talked to Stella, the woman who took us out with the dog sleds, or when we talked with a man named Jan Kortzen who took us out on his boat to the icebergs, there is a concern. These are people who have lived in Greenland their whole lives. And they're pointing to these tangible examples every day of how climate has affected them.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
And the other thing that we heard from them, particularly from Jan Kortzen, is these are all people who depend on tourism, right? They want more people to come to this small town of fewer than 5,000 people to go on their dog sleds, to go out on their boats. But they want to make sure that as Greenland opens up more to the world, the island has invested a ton of money in new airports and stuff.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
They want that money to stay locally rather than to benefit outside operators. And that's a really big tension in the small town that we went to, too.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
We were pretty well received. One thing that we were warned about from people that we were talking to in pre-interviews is that there was just a lot of fatigue around international journalists and American journalists. And You could really see that. I mean, as we were walking around Nuke in particular, we saw tons of other journalism, several other big U.S.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
outlets were there at the same time we were there. People were nice, but people were pretty over it at times. I'll give you just one superficial example. We did a story where we asked people, you know, what they thought about President Trump's ambitions and how they felt about if that were to come to pass, potentially becoming a part of the U.S.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
And we went to a place called Nuke Center, which is like the biggest mall in Greenland. And we're standing there at the doors and we're just like sitting there asking people, hey, do you want to talk to us? Hey, can I ask you a question about President Trump?
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
And at one point, things got so bleak that I was actually sitting there tallying in my notepad how many people said no and how many people said yes. And we got more than a dozen no's before we even got one yes and we only got one. Thank you.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
There's this word that a woman that we met in Greenland told us. It's called sila, which means weather. But it also means, like, you can't control the weather. You just have to adapt around it.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
We were supposed to leave on a Thursday. No flight happens. The next day we get up. We pack all our stuff. We get to the airport. We get on a plane. Plane gets diverted. We land in a completely different part of Greenland. We're there for like a half hour or something like that. Back on the plane. The cycle plays out over and over again. Finally, I think this is on Sunday. Pack up all our stuff.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
Well, on this topic, people were actually pretty uniform. There was a poll that came out shortly before we arrived in Greenland, and the stat was pretty striking to us. Just 6% of Greenlanders said that they wanted their island to become part of the United States. Just 6%. And that really bore itself out as we were going around and talking to people.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
The thing that sticks in my mind that I kept hearing over and over and over again from people is they would say Greenland is not for sale. That is something that Greenland's prime minister has said. That is something that's been echoed by Denmark's prime minister because Greenland, of course, is an autonomous territory of Denmark. That just was the thing that people kept coming back to.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
It is very clear that I think someone told us at one point, we don't want another colonizer. I'm paraphrasing here a bit.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
helped orchestrate Don Jr., President Trump's son's visit to Greenland that happened, I think, a little bit before the inauguration. And what's interesting about him and listening to him when we sat down with him is that even he didn't come out and say that he wanted the U.S. to acquire the island. He made the case that he wants to see
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
Greenland enter what's called a free association agreement with the United States so he wants to see the United States provide economic support military support defense support but he kind of stopped short of saying that he wanted to be part of this country he did not say that he wants to be American.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
The thing that surprised me the most was how challenging it would be to get people to talk. Like I knew the influx of journalists would be there and I know they had had so much attention. And like on these trips, you know, you pre-plan so much. You do pre-interviews. You send emails. But like that's just not the way that things happen there. It's very much online.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
an island where the best interviews we got, I think, were by way of introduction of someone else. The people who really stuck with me the most were people that we were introduced to, either by our fixer Yona that we worked with or by other people that we had met. The word of mouth currency was just so much more important.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
When I told most people in my life, like outside of our business, hey, I'm going to Greenland for this trip, most people came in with the baseline of knowing nothing about this island. And I think that... That's really flattened the culture in some ways. So we were really intentional about doing stories. Yes, we talked about President Trump's ambitions, but we also talked about dog sledding.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
We also went to a kayak club and watched the construction of traditional Greenlandic kayakers. We sat down with an award-winning Greenlandic chef who talked to us about indigenous cuisine and the food landscape there. So I think for me, what was most enriching was trying to open up those other parts of Greenland to a U.S.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
audience that really hasn't given this place and its people and its history much consideration.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
Leave the hotel. Get on the plane again. Plane gets diverted again to this place called Asiat. So we're now here at the Asiat Airport in Greenland. On our way, we're attempting again for the third time to fly to Ilulissat. We're going to see if we're going to make it.
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On the road in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle
And finally, after about two hours of sitting there and wondering what's going to happen, this announcement comes over the loudspeaker. It is in either Greenlandic or Danish languages. I do not speak. I didn't have to understand those languages to know what was happening because everybody started cheering. And we actually made it four days later.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
For weeks now, President Donald Trump has been issuing memos and executive orders targeting big law firms. Here's how he laid it out on Fox News.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
Perkins Coie fought the order targeting it and won a temporary stay. A federal judge said the order likely violates the firm's First, Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights. One of the firm's targeted poll, Weiss, cut a deal with the White House in order to have an executive order rescinded. Other law firms have stayed silent. And that doesn't sit well with Rachel Cohen.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
She was, until last week, a lawyer at another big firm, Skadden Arps. On Friday, she submitted her resignation in a staff-wide email, which she later read on TikTok.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
Consider this. Rachel Cohen says Trump's pressuring of big, private law firms is part of a broader effort to reshape the American justice system in his favor, and that so far, big law isn't standing up for itself. From NPR, I'm Juana Summers. It's Consider This from NPR. Rachel Cohen had been speaking out about Trump's executive orders before her resignation on social media and in an open letter.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
Trump's moves suspended firm security clearances, prohibited government contractors from retaining the firms, and even barred their employees from federal buildings. He also issued an executive memo threatening sanctions on any law firms that pursue, quote, frivolous, unreasonable, and vexatious litigation against the United States.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
So the first thing I asked her was, what was the tipping point?
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
I just want to take a second to spell out some of the details of the Paul Weiss case for people who may not be as familiar with it as you are. President Trump levied this executive order to strip the firm of security clearances and government contracts, in part because it rehired a lawyer who'd left the firm to prosecute a case against Trump.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
And then Paul Weiss agreed to concessions to get the executive order rescinded. That included $40 million in pro bono work and cases aligning with the administration's agenda. Spell out for me why that is so troubling to you.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
Now, Paul Weiss took in over $2.6 billion in revenue last year, according to Law 360, and its chairman said in an internal email, even given that figure, I'm quoting, it was very likely that our firm would not be able to survive a protracted dispute with the administration. Hearing that, what does that say about the state of the legal profession at this moment?
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
In your view, what do you think President Trump is trying to do in picking this fight with big law?
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
Here's how Professor Timothy Zick at William & Mary Law School describes it all.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
When we talk about big law, we're really talking about a group of a whole lot of different firms who not only have to compete for big cases, but who would also have to defend themselves individually in what would be costly and time-consuming battles.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
I know that there are some open letters and there's talk of amicus briefs, but apart from rhetoric, is there anything that you see that law firms can do collectively here?
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
That was attorney Rachel Cohen. Rachel, thank you.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
This episode was produced by Mia Venkat and Connor Donovan. It was edited by Patrick Jaron Watanonan. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. You also heard reporting from NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas at the top of this episode. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
Each of the firms had fallen afoul of Trump in one way or another. Perkins Coie, for example, represented Hillary Clinton in the 2016 campaign and had a hand in the creation of the infamous Trump-Russia dossier. With another firm, Paul Weiss, the complaints included the rehiring of an attorney who had left to help prosecute a case against Trump.
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Trump targets Big Law, and Big Law appears intimidated
In court, the Trump administration has argued that the president has the authority to take action against companies if he believes they can't be trusted with national secrets. University of Pennsylvania law professor Claire Finkelstein says it appears clear the president has a different goal.