We have a wide ranging conversation that’s at times playful and at other times blunt and unfiltered. We discuss what Emanuel calls a dangerous erosion of American deterrence with China, North Korea, and Russia, which he says is being tested right now. We also dive into some of the more contentious issues showing up in political conversations, including the fight over the future of the Democratic Party and the discussions around Israel and Gaza—with his stances at times drawing pushback from those in his own party. Plus, why Emanuel says winning red and purple districts is imperative in the interest of delivering progressive legislation.

We also want to mention the passing of the extraordinary Dolly Parton. In addition to a tribute honoring Dolly’s seven-decade career and compassion, her family asked fans to honor her legacy by considering a donation to her Imagination Library. It’s provided more than 300 million free books to children since it started more than 30 years ago.

We will always love you, Dolly. We are all better because of you.

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Is the U.S. more vulnerable now than before 9/11? Former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence thinks so.

“What we’re dealing with now is an internal, potentially external threat to our democracy,” Figliuzzi said when describing our most serious threats. “As a generic bucket, I would say it’s the cyber threat. And then let’s move to, which is something we never talked about when I was the head of counterintel, let’s talk about the domestic threat and combine the two, that foreign intel services are actually helping with propaganda and disinformation and misinformation. They’ll do it in a big way in the midterms. And trying to shape the minds of Americans and how we think, we are still our greatest concern right now. And that’s a sobering thought.”

Frank joins Grounded to dissect those current security vulnerabilities, cyber attacks on our critical infrastructure, a staffing exodus at the FBI, and more.

“What we think we know is that between 3,000 and 5,000 FBI employees are now gone, and that's just recently happened,” Figliuzzi said. “The categories for those include those who are literally walked out of the building because they happened to work on January 6th cases or some Trump case.”

Plus, the concerns over China as we monitor the developments in Iran. There’s a lot to learn in this episode! Don’t forget to follow Frank on his channel!

We can’t forget to say a huge HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Jon Tester, who turns 70 on Aug. 21. Post your birthday messages below!

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Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, joins us to discuss her new book, Ordinary People, Extraordinary Times (out August 25th), which argues that defending democracy isn't just a job for lawyers and politicians, but a role for all of us. We discuss the practical “to do lists” and “tip sheets” from the book, including things you can do in a day, a weekend, or a week, plus a section on staying joyful along the way. We also dig into her organization’s ongoing legal fights and Democracy Forward’s partnership with the Human Rights Campaign to counter Turning Point USA on college campuses.

Don’t miss the lesson on harvesting wheat and the wild rumors swirling around the U.S. Senate race in Montana.

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The images of the overnight devastation from the Spokane Complex Fires are shocking, but as we’ve seen, this isn’t the first fire to destroy an entire neighborhood and it won’t be the last. While the immediate conversation centers around Spokane’s recovery, it leads to a much broader conversation about wildfire behavior as a result of climate change and the policies that landed us here.

We invited Shawn Borgen to join us to untangle it in a substantive conversation about fire. Borg recently retired as superintendent of the Flathead Hotshots, one of the most elite firefighting teams in the country. We discuss what’s changed over his decades of fighting fires, the money and staffing cuts, and the broad misunderstanding of what’s known as the “fire paradox.” Plus, Borg lays out his own practical advice for preparation, no matter where you live.

“The surface of the earth, for the most part, is covered in hairy fuel of various sizes and thicknesses,” Borg said. “And it will all burn, regardless of where you live. I have fought fire in almost every state, border to border, coast to coast. If you live in and around anything from grass up through trees, it will, it can burn. So no one is immune to it.”

Just like the people of Altadena, Louisville, and Lahaina before them, the people of Spokane are trying to figure out what comes next. There are numerous organizations available to help, including:

Spokane H.O.M.E. Starts Here fund: collecting donations for impacted residents

2nd Harvest: helping displaced families with access to food

Innovia Foundation: offering support for organizations helping with needs

HEART: collecting money to help with affected animals

Catholic Charities of Eastern Washington: supporting individuals and families impacted by the fires

American Red Cross/KREMCares: providing shelter and other resources to those impacted

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Forstag has gained a lot of national attention already, including high-profile endorsements. End Citizens United added its name to that list in June when Forstag joined the organization’s Unrig Washington program.

“Sam Forstag understands that this corruption is at the root of rising costs and unaffordable health care, and it’s why billionaires keep getting tax breaks while working people are left behind,” ECU President Tiffany Muller said at the time of endorsement. “He refuses to take a dime of corporate PAC money to prove to voters that he’s only accountable to them. We are proud to endorse Sam and look forward to helping him win in November.”

We also discuss Forstag’s priorities in Congress, what he’s doing to gain bipartisan support (in a state that requires it), and a little bit about leather boots. Plus, what it’s like to be in this historic moment in politics.

Also, please don’t miss this important story about Sorelys Coromoto Rodriguez Olivar.

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This morning, I learned of a Venezuelan woman sitting in a Minnesota detention facility who no longer believes her three young sons are alive. She has stopped eating. She won’t leave her bed. When her attorney last visited her, they said she was wheeled in with shackles on her wrists, waist, and ankles. Her name is Sorelys Coromoto Rodriguez Olivar. People close to her say she did everything the “right way,” and it still wasn’t enough. Her sons are very much alive and safe. And she needs our help.

It’s been six months since my reporting trip to my hometown of Minneapolis to cover the anguish, grief, and anger felt collectively over the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti at the hands of DHS officers. I spoke with so many incredible Minnesotans that week who spent nearly all of their free time helping others. For some that meant filling bags with frozen corn in a church basement to be distributed to families in need. For others, it meant literally hiding people in their homes. While the national media has mostly moved on from these stories, my friends and contacts in the Twin Cities say the horrors of Operation Metro Surge are still felt daily. And community members are still helping every single day.

A woman I grew up with, Caroline, was recently connected to a family that needed Spanish translation help to access mutual aid. She met with three young boys and quickly realized they were going to need a lot more than an occasional grocery run. While the boys are safe and cared for, they need their mom.

Court documents show Sorelys Coromoto Rodriguez Olivar came to the United States from Venezuela in March 2024, presenting at the border and applying for asylum for herself and her three young sons. They were granted humanitarian parole. She secured contract work with a tree company and was eventually transferred to Minnesota.

In December, ICE agents showed up at her job site and arrested her and other coworkers.

Caroline says a co-worker took custody of Sorelys’ children, assuming this would be quickly resolved and Sorelys would be released within a few days. She wasn’t the target of the operation. She was in the United States legally, had work authorization, no criminal record, and no valid reason to be arrested.

That was more than seven months ago. Sorelys is still detained.

Caroline says she’s been transferred, “lost” in the system, placed in removal proceedings, and more. She’s begged to be allowed to self-deport, to return to Venezuela with her boys.

“Her mental health has declined so much over these [seven] months that she has now convinced herself that her sons are no longer alive and is refusing to eat, leave her bed, or speak with anyone,” Caroline wrote in a lengthy post about the situation. “The last appointment she had with her attorney, she had to be brought out in a wheelchair, shackled and handcuffed on her legs, waist, and wrists, and appeared extremely thin and delusional.”

People connected to the family are trying once more today to get her released to a local hospital, but they don’t have high hopes.

“If they still don’t release her after this, I truly don’t know what other options we have,” Caroline wrote. “The crazy thing is this is a common situation. This same scenario has been happening over and over to detainees ever since Operation Metro Surge. Sorelys’ case is especially sad because of the three boys left with no family, but all of these cases involve unnecessary heartbreak and wasted resources.”

It’s my hope we can amplify this story in the same way we amplified the stories of Liam Ramos and Kilmar Abrego Garcia to provide help. I know that for every Liam, Kilmar, and Sorelys, there are thousands of others whose names we don’t know and whose faces aren’t ingrained in our memory. These are the people Renee Good and Alex Pretti were standing up for. These are the stories we cannot look away from.

UPDATE:

What can you do?

1. Share so this story gets attention far and wide

2. Submit a complaint via the DHS Civil Rights Complaint Portal

3. Contact lawmakers in Minnesota (links below):

   1. Sen. Amy Klobuchar

   2. Sen. Tina Smith

   3. Rep. Ilhan Omar

   4. Attorney General Keith Ellison

   5. Gov. Tim Walz & Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan

4. If you know any lawyers willing to help, share with them

Erin’s focus is typically the House, but she could have fooled us with her comprehensive and nuanced knowledge about the Senate map. She lays out Democrats' top defensive priorities in Georgia and Michigan to pickup targets in North Carolina, Maine, Alaska, and Ohio. We cover the Democrats’ “white whale” race in Texas, Iowa's Turek-Hinson race, and the wildcard role of independent candidates like Montana's Seth Bodnar and Nebraska's Dan Osborne.

On the House side, Erin lays out why redistricting has reshaped the battleground, and which toss-up seats matter most. While the Democrats are favored to retake the majority, Erin explains why it’s not a foregone conclusion.

To dig further into the races, the recent ratings changes, and more analysis from Erin, head to The Cook Political Report ratings page!

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On Monday, we’ll have a live conversation with the Cook Political Report's about the midterm landscape. Let us know which races you want us to dig into!

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“So literally hot off the presses, I just filed this response,” Phang said. “And my response calls [Blanche] out for violating the judge’s order, not to mention still as of today, July 13th, 2026, still violating the federal law, the Epstein Files Transparency Act as he’s on the eve of his confirmation hearing in Senate Judiciary. And what I do is I ask the judge to fine him $1,000 a day until he complies. Him, not the Department of Justice, but Todd Blanche.”

We also discuss headlines including the latest ICE involved fatal shooting in Maine and a new court ruling that recommends disciplinary action for Blanche and others for their involvement in the Trump IRS settlement slush fund move. We can’t let the episode end without some combine talk and another invitation to bring Katie to Big Sky Country.

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“We’re the place that people can go to. We’re the off ramp,” Logis said. “We’re the new community where people can find others who went through similar odysseys of leaving and find a place where they can reclaim their identity their empathy and their individuality.”

Plus, Logis lays out why he predicts an electoral revolt in November.

“I think there are more than we realize who are privately doubting and questioning their belief system,” Logis said. “It’s why I would encourage people to reach back out to their MAGA friends and loved ones because their friends and loved ones might be going through some doubts right now, might be experiencing some of the cognitive dissonance that I did.”

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We also dig into the president’s persistent obsession with the 2020 results and passing the Save America Act, which Becker says will never happen.

“At the core of all of the false claims is the idea that Democrats somehow out of power in 2020, in the middle of a global pandemic, with President Trump controlling the entire federal government, managed the greatest conspiracy in world history to steal an election from him and that nobody was talking,” Becker said. “And then four years later, while those same Democrats held all of that power of the federal government, They forgot to do it again. That’s how ridiculous all of this is.”

Plus, Becker lays out his idea on how we can get record midterm voter turnout this November.

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It’s what the city manager of Social Circle, Georgia was up against earlier this year. Eric Taylor joins grounded to take us through the six-month fight to stop the Department of Homeland Security from turning a vacant warehouse into an ICE detention camp.

The fight paid off. Taylor received welcome news earlier this month when he learned DHS is scrapping its planned detention center in Social Circle.

“It was just it was a half-baked concept from the very beginning,” Taylor said. “DHS, they put us—not just Social Circle, but other communities around the country as well—through this process and just didn’t share any information at all whatsoever. And, you know, local government, that’s just not the way development works.”

Other proposed projects at this site had been previously denied because of a lack of water and sewer services. DHS didn’t seem to care. Taylor put a lock on the water meter in March. But that’s not all he did.

“This is the other part of the story that people don’t know. I actually put a valve on the sewer line. [We] closed the valve that said that you couldn’t send your sewage over to us until you told us what was going on, which was really going to create a big problem for them.”

A shitty problem, indeed.

The city of Social Circle eventually filed a lawsuit on the grounds of environmental violations, procedural violations and local nuisance laws. The lawsuit is still active.

It’s still not clear what will happen to the building, which DHS purchased for $128.6 million. It could be sold or it could go to another agency within the federal government.

“At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what they put in the building as long it’s still a federal agency,” Taylor said. “They still don’t follow NEPA, they still don’t follow the Administrative Procedures Act.”

You can see more of our joint reporting with from Social Circle, Georgia here.

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A few days ago, our friend connected us with , the founder of . The disabled veteran and advocate recently joined forces with to craft a call to action based on a recent Department of Justice memo that’s raising serious concerns, but hasn’t been widely covered in mainstream media yet. The Arc published a great explainer.

The memo basically reinterprets the 1999 Supreme Court Olmstead decision that ruled disabled people can’t be forced to be institutionalized if they can get support and services in their communities. The ruling said the institutional segregation of people with disabilities and mental illness is a form of discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act. That decision has been the basis for requiring states to improve access for community-based services. People briefed on the situation told reporters with Bloomberg Law that White House adviser Stephen Miller was the driving force behind the DOJ memo.

The DOJ memo doesn’t change the law, but it does signal a shift. The National Alliance on Mental Illness says the language in the memo has the potential to promote a shift back toward institutionalization. It prompted Sen. Tammy Duckworth and other Senate Democrats to introduce a resolution that reaffirms the promise of Olmstead. It prompted Paro and his partners to publish their own call to action, saying this is an issue which will impact all of us. “Now is the time to speak — before they change the laws — and not after,” Paro’s group wrote.

As the Arc wrote, “this isn’t the end of Olmstead. It’s the start of a new fight to protect it.”

Stay tuned for more farm content from Big Sandy. If you want to learn more about MPS skatepark builds, make sure you check out Montana Grind and Paving the Way, two documentaries that feature Ament’s projects!

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“Right now our system is broken because of the infestation of stupid,” Steele said. “The infestation of people who don’t give a damn about public service and are more interested in their grift. How much I can make. How much I can churn the system up.How can I piss off my base enough to write me a check?”

Plus, Steele lays out why this upcoming election really is so critical, despite how many times in our lives we’ve heard that before.

“I can’t even begin to express to you how important this election is this November. And you know why you know it’s important? Look at what Donald Trump is trying to do to stop it,” Steele said.

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Tune in tomorrow when we chat with former RNC Chair and co-host of the Weeknight Michael Steele!

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“If I have an amazing deal, I would definitely run out and hold a press conference and show you the text right now. The fact that I’m not doing that tells you that I don’t have an amazing deal,” Wolfers explains.

He breaks it down in even simpler terms.

“If you’re on a dating app and the person doesn’t have their photo up what would you infer?”

We cover the war in Iran’s economic ripple effects, including energy price spikes and the true cost of the conflict to people across the globe. We also tackle tariffs, the current impact on farmers, and what the AI revolution means for the future of work.

Wolfers just launched the new Platypus Economics Substack channel with a simple mission: teach the world economics in an accessible way that helps us all collectively.

“So, look, we all have our own theories about what ails the world right now. Mine is I think the world would be a better place if we all knew a little bit more economics,” Wolfers said. “The radicalizing moment for me is actually look at another field, medicine, where they’ve discovered these incredible vaccines that can prevent enormous amounts of illness and injury and death. And there’s not enough trust, public trust, in what the doctors are doing and people won’t even take the vaccines. Now my field, economics, we don’t have literal vaccines but we have metaphorical vaccines. We have ways of understanding the world that we think can lead people better, richer, fuller lives.”

If you haven’t already, please follow and subscribe to Justin’s incredible new venture!

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The organization’s president and CEO Maya Wiley joined Grounded for a wide-ranging conversation to discuss several interconnected threats to civil rights.

We discuss the indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, the erosion of the Voting Rights Act, ICE detentions of people based on appearance and language rather than actual status, and threats to the nonprofit sector broadly. Wiley emphasizes that the impacts of these attacks and threats reach everyone across the country while laying out the tools we all have to fight back.

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We also spend some time talking about the emotional and impactful interview Scott Pelley gave with the New York Times over the weekend about his firing from CBS News. We highly recommend watching or listening in its entirety.

“I’ve never worn the uniform,” Pelley said when responding to criticism from President Trump. “But I’ve been in combat for this country, in Afghanistan and Iraq, Kuwait. I’ve been shot at, spent nights in foxholes filling up with water in the desert. I’m not aware that the president of the United States has ever done any of those things for his country. Please correct me if I’m wrong. You become a journalist because you love the First Amendment. You become a journalist because you love the country. And while all the other descriptions that the president used about me might be applicable, not that one. [Tears up] There is no democracy without journalism. It can’t be done. That is why I am a journalist.”

We couldn’t have said it better, Scott. Thank you for your voice, your bravery, and your dedication to journalism. You can also catch Pelley’s Walter Cronkite Award acceptance speech from December here.

Before signing off, here’s the link to the “car farmer” story from the Tester farm that won Eric Gaylord and team an E.B. Craney Award from the Montana Broadcasters Association.

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