Code Switch

Mahmoud Khalil is suing the Trump administration, alleging a "public-private conspiracy" to punish him for pro-Palestinian speech. The law he's using dates back to 1871 — it's called the Ku Klux Klan Act. It's the same statute civil rights attorney Randolph McLaughlin used in the 1980s when he become one of the first lawyers to successfully sue the Klan. McLaughlin walks us through how that Reconstruction-era law has been used against the KKK, Unite the Right, and maybe next against ICE.Support public media with NPR+ and enjoy perks for over 25 podcasts like this one. This show's perks include sponsor-free listening. Learn more at plus.npr.org.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

"Be vulnerable." "We love your authenticity." "Bring your full self to work." Sound familiar? In this episode, we talk to Jodi-Ann Burey, author of Authentic: The of Bringing Your Full Self to Work, about why you should absolutely NOT do those things at work -- especially if you're a Black woman.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Patriot Front is a white nationalist group that focuses on high visibility stunts, like banner drops, disrupting events, or swarming Washington, DC for Independence Day. Meanwhile, the State Department has convened 60 nations against what it calls far-left terrorism. We talk to NPR's Odette Yousef about who the guys in Patriot Front actually are, why their finances resemble a pyramid scheme selling stickers and stencils, and what it means that the federal government is aiming its counterterrorism attention in a very different direction.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The potato may be one of the world's most beloved foods but it's also an insult. In Colombia, speaking with "una papa en la boca" means you mumble — or that you're too posh. Producer Christina Cala follows the potato from Bad Bunny to the Andes to her own mother's kitchen, and finds that potato jokes are often about whose heritage gets celebrated and who gets treated like they're worth understanding.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Longtime homeowners — often Black seniors — are being tricked into signing away the deeds to their own homes, then getting evicted from them. It's called deed theft, and it's rampant in gentrifying neighborhoods like Bed Stuy, where brownstones that redlining once made cheap now sell for millions. New York City Councilmember Chi Ossé and WNYC/Gothamist reporter David Brand explain how the scam works, why it targets Black homeowners, and why it's so hard to stop.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

All good (and complicated) things must come to an end, and the World Cup is no exception. To deal with the anticipatory grief ahead of the Spain v. Argentina final, NPR World Cup and Lionel Messi expert Jasmine Garsd hops on the mic to talk all things fútbol. Lace up your limited edition pink cleats: We're talking African soccer's moment, diaspora players, colonizers vs. colonies, and what's up with race erasure on Argentina's team.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

This summer, protesters connected to a demonstration outside the Prairieland ICE detention center in North Texas were sentenced to as much as 100 years in prison. It's the first case prosecuted under President Trump's National Security Presidential Memorandum 7, which targets "extremism on migration, race, and gender" and classifies antifa as a domestic terrorism organization. What's striking is the evidence: zines, Signal messages, hosting a book club. This week, we talk with Guardian reporter Lex McMenamin about what this case could mean for dissent going forward.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

A lot went down this term in the Supreme Court. So, we're breaking down the landmark SCOTUS decisions that affect Black voters, trans athletes and immigrants. B.A. Parker and Code Switch producer Jess Kung go over the outcomes of the cases we've been watching, and NPR's immigration correspondent Ximena Bustillo helps us untangle the latest for immigrants.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Pete Hegseth's Pentagon has been dismantling diversity initiatives and blocking the promotions of high-ranking Black officers. This week, Parker talks with The Atlantic's Clint Smith, who interviewed two dozen Black service members about the long, contradictory history of Black patriotism and what it means to serve a country that has always struggled with how to honor them.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

We have been told the American Revolution was fought over taxation and representation. But the last entry of the Declaration of Independence focuses on the founding fathers' contempt for quote merciless Indian savages unquote. On this July 4th, the 250th anniversary of its founding, Rebecca Nagle, host of the new podcast First America asks: How did an entire country miss a major point of its founding document?See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Hundreds of people detained at an ICE detention center in Newark, NJ refused to eat and work for a month. They were protesting the conditions inside — spoiled food, lack of medical care, overcrowding. The detainees are the ones who actually keep the facility running — cooking, cleaning, doing laundry — all while getting paid a dollar a day. This week, two reporters who have been covering the strikes, José Olivares and Sophie Hurwitz, talk about what happens when detainees stop eating and working — and what it means that the government insists none of it is happening.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Since October 2025, the U.S. has admitted more than 6,000 refugees — and all but three are white South Africans. The Trump administration says Afrikaners are fleeing a "genocide." They're not. This week, we look at how we got here: a conversation with a reporter who was in the Oval Office when Trump pushed this conspiracy theory on South Africa's president — and what his fixation on white South Africans reveals about anxieties over white replacement here in the U.S.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Any day now, the Supreme Court is expected to rule on the Trump administration's executive order limiting birthright citizenship. But beyond the ruling, the fight for who belongs in a country is much older and broader than the United States. Gene talks with Daisy Hernández, the author of Citizenship: Notes on an American Myth, about what we can learn from both other nations' and our own history about where we might be headed.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Joy is not a crumb. It's cookouts with soul music, celebrating what Ossie Davis called the full sweetness of our Blackness. But what exactly does the phrase "joy is resistance," which has been flooding social media, mean? This Juneteenth, we're asking what joy actually is, when it can be a tool for social change, and why the slogan has become so popular -- even when joy itself feels more tenuous.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

After nearly 10 years of planning and construction, the Obama Presidential Center is opening on the South Side of Chicago — right across the street from an under-resourced high school, in a segregated neighborhood where home prices have jumped. Who is the Center for, and what will it mean for the people who live there? We get into it with two South Siders who've covered the Center for years — journalist Natalie Moore and the Invisible Institute's Maira Khwaja — about the Chi's tricky relationship with the president who claims them.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

A viral video of a young Black man frolicking in an Oregon meadow sent B.A. Parker looking for a deeper answer: what does it take for people of color to feel safe outdoors? We dive into the racist history of what it means to be a Black person outside -- and why that complicates people's relationship today to the outdoors.  Parkers talks with the self-described "Black frolicker" Daniyel and Pamela Slaughter of the Oregon-based nonprofit  People of Color Outdoors.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The DOJ created a $1.776 billion fund to compensate January 6 defendants. The fund may not survive, but the federal redress system it was reaching into — built by Native nations over generations — is still intact. So today on Code Switch: who counts as having been harmed by the state?See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

It's no secret that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has embraced the idea of crusading for American dominance — he published a book titled American Crusade and has several tattoos of crusader iconography. And that language has become a part of how Hegseth talks about the U.S. war with Iran. B.A. Parker talks to the religion scholar Matthew Taylor about Hegseth's corner of Christianity and its connection with Christian nationalism.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program has been around for almost 14 years — long enough that the so-called "DACA kids" are now middle-aged adults with jobs, mortgages and families. But the Trump administration is making it harder to hold onto the only legal status they've ever had: slowing down processing, stripping benefits, and detaining and even deporting some recipients. This week, NPR's Ximena Bustillo takes us to Arizona to meet people living in limbo, and asks what it means to build an entire life on a permit that expires every two years.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The Supreme Court is about to rule on whether states can ban transfeminine student athletes from playing on girls' and women's teams. But we're talking to journalist Imara Jones about why these cases aren't just about school sports. They come out of a massive wave of state-level anti-trans legislation that Imara says is part of a broader movement to undermine discrimination protections — by going after the small, vulnerable minority of trans girls.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

How have recommendation algorithms affected language? Linguist Adam Aleksic — aka the Etymology Nerd — says most “Gen-Z slang” is either appropriated from Black people or incels. This week, we trace how -maxxing went from the eugenicist looksmaxxing subculture to trending TikToks to the Pentagon tweeting about “lethality maxxing.” And we ask what's actually at stake when we use words without knowing where they come from.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

In the U.S., roughly 8 in 10 kids from lower-income households grow up with few or no swimming skills — and Black and Latino children lag behind their white peers. Those gaps aren't an accident. They trace back to a long history of segregated public pools, and to fears of the water that have been passed down through generations. This week, we follow Jasmine Romero, who in her mid-thirties walked into a room full of four- and five-year-olds to take her first swim class, determined to break the cycle before her own child is born.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Latinos make up at least 50% of all Customs and Border Patrol agents and 20% of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents — which has a lot of critics asking, why? We talk to Geraldo Cadava, professor of Latino Studies at Northwestern and contributor to the Atlantic, to break down some of the reasons Latinos join ICE, and he tells us, there are many people who believe in the mission of immigration enforcement.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Happy tenth birthday to us! In true Gemini fashion - we're that sign - we're celebrating by exploring our duality through astrology. Our intrepid Aquarius, B.A. Parker, talks to an astrologer and a science writer - a true believer and a real skeptic - about why Black and Latina women are twice as likely as men to believe in astrology. She also finds out what's written in the stars for the show. Spoiler alert: our birth chart is cute. And we are ready to be outside!See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Ever heard of the Savannah Bananas? They're a baseball team with millions of followers on TikTok and Instagram — known as much for their dance routines and shenanigans as their actual baseball. Now their league, Banana Ball, has resurrected the Indianapolis Clowns, a Negro League team with a contentious history of racial minstrelsy. We chop it up with journalist Josh Levin, who followed the Clowns through their Banana Ball debut.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act marked what many historians mark as the actual beginning of democracy in the US. But last week the Supreme Court gutted what was left of the landmark civil rights law. NPR's Hansi Lo Wang joins us to talk through what it means for Black political power, especially in the South.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Parenting is one of the toughest jobs in the world. Between choosing a neighborhood to live in or whether to send your kid to public school, there are a lot of decisions that feel high stakes — and sticky, especially when it comes to race. We're here to help. This week we're digging into our archives to bring you some parenting advice around some of the parenting-and-race dilemmas our listeners have faced.This episode features advice from Cassandra Harewood, child and adolescent psychiatrist, Amy Stuart Wells, professor emeritus of sociology and education at Teachers College at Columbia University, Jenn Jackson, professor of political science at Syracuse University focusing on Blackness and gender, Mark Anthony Neal, professor of African & African American Studies at Duke University, and Gigliana Melzi, associate professor of applied psychology at New York University.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Motherhood in the U.S. is revered. Actual mothers? Not so much. So where's a bedraggled mom to turn when she feels overworked, overwhelmed, and underappreciated? Turns out, momfluencers are stepping in to fill that void, including a particular category of momfluencer: the tradwife. We dive into that world to understand how it might intersect with the Trump administration, what it has to do with white supremacy, and where moms of color fit in.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Over the past few weeks, there have been multiple high-profile incidents of Black men committing acts of violence against their loved ones, from a man in Shreveport killing his children, to the former Lieutenant Governor of Virginia killing himself and his wife. On this episode, we're asking: What does this violence have to do with patriarchy? What does it have to do with mental health? What does it have to do with race and gender? And what would it take to create a culture that actually protects Black women and children?See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

At most elite colleges and universities, affirmative action is a thing of the past. But admissions offices are still interested in building racially diverse incoming classes — which can mean looking at students' essays to help determine their background. In those essays, Black students have been often been encouraged to write about experiences of overcoming trauma in order to help underscore their race. Our guest, the sociologist Aya Waller-Bey, says that practice has troubling implications for how we understand what it means to have an authentic Black experience.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The Trump administration has been very candid about their disdain for all things DEI. But it's not just conservatives who have critiques. On this episode, we're talking to Jennifer C. Pan, author of Selling Social Justice: Why the Rich Love Antiracism, about why she thinks people on the left should be skeptical of DEI programs as well. We get into how DEI programs are frequently used as a tool for large corporations to assert their moral authority — without actually sacrificing their bottom line, or improving conditions for workers writ large.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The Trump administration's recent military actions have had certain observers asking... are we going full empire? But Daniel Immerwahr, a historian and the author of How to Hide an Empire, argues that the U.S. has engaged in empire building for hundreds of years — we've just been sneakier about it than other countries. So on today's show, we're breaking down what that history of colonization has looked like, and how President Trump's international escapades are scrambling the global order.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

What makes people pay a lot of attention to some wars and crises, but not others? And what does that attention actually do for the people in those situations? We're looking at Sudan, which has entered its fourth year of a civil war this week. But, unlike in Gaza, the violence and famine there has struggled to break through headlines in the U.S. We talk to Sudanese journalist Isma'il Kushkush, political scientist Scott Strauss, Sudan expert Alexander de Waal, and political scientist Mai Hassan.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Do you vote Republican or Democrat? And why does that answer reveal so much about the rest of who you are? We talk to political scientist Lilliana Mason about how party affiliation has become a “mega-identity” — a lens through which we see all other aspects of identity — and how that shapes views on race, political behavior, and so much more.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The Trump administration has called more and more groups “terrorists,” from “narco-terrorists” in Ecuador to people who protest ICE to the entire Democratic party. But it's also nothing new. We talk to Saher Selod, expert on the racialized surveillance of Muslims about the effects of the war on terrorism after 9/11, and historian Alex Lubin about how even since colonial settlers were fighting Indigenous people to establish frontier towns, the word “terrorist” has been used by the state to enact violence and surveillance against whoever they want.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

What do the women in Bama Rush, beauty pageants and President Trump's orbit have in common? Their look traces back to the beauty traditions of the white, antebellum South. We talk to Elizabeth Bronwyn Boyd, author Southern Beauty: Race, Ritual and Memory in the Modern South, about how nostalgia for a Southern past influences the aesthetics of today.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The MAGA look -- you know the one: dramatic eyeliner, long, wavy hair, sheath dresses -- is a defining feature of President Trump's Republican party. And it's about a lot more than appearances. Journalist Inae Oh joins us to talk about what the aesthetics of MAGA tell us about power, influence, race and femininity.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

People have been talking about being "allies" for a long time now. But what has that actually meant, over the years? And how performative should allyship be? One of our guests says, keep it to yourself. The other says, be loud and proud. So that's what we're getting into today with comedians Hari Kondabolu and Milly Tamarez — the many ways (good and bad) to be a so-called ally.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

On Monday, Sen. Markwayne Mullin was confirmed as the newest head of the Department of Homeland Security, replacing Kristi Noem. It's an enormously consequential role that involves taking charge of ICE, border patrol, and TSA. And Mullin is an interesting choice for the role — he's a conservative, Christian citizen of Cherokee nation, known both for his ability to reach across the aisle, and for being a political firebrand. So today on the show, we're asking: What will Markwayne Mullin's leadership of DHS mean for Indian Country? And what will it mean for the nation as a whole?To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

When President Trump says things like “fake news,” “witch hunt” or even “Make America Great Again,” he's not just using catchy phrases -- he's persuading people into a way of thinking and believing. This week on Code Switch, we talk to Amanda Montell, author of Cultish and co-host of the podcast Sounds Like A Cult, about what the language of MAGA shares with cult language, and why it matters.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth recently put Scouting America — formerly known as the Boy Scouts — "on notice." The once great organization was becoming too woke, he said, and had been tarnished by embracing DEI. On this episode, we're talking to Benjamin René Jordan, author of Modern Manhood and the Boy Scouts of America, about the Scouts' surprisingly progressive history. And we ask him about the complex relationship between scouting and the military.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

It's Alabama, 1963. A black woman stands before a judge, but she refuses to acknowledge his questions until he addresses her by the same honorific given to white women: “Miss.” That woman's name is Mary Hamilton. Her case eventually reached the Supreme Court and changed the courts, and eventually broader culture, for good. We're revisiting the largely forgotten story of Miss Mary Hamilton, a Freedom Rider who struck a blow against a pervasive form of disrespect.To manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy