Stay ConnectedIn each episode of Scandalized, political scientists Charlie Hunt and Jaci Kettler unpack a political scandal from American history: the story, its scandalous details, the political meaning and motivations behind the act. What can political science teach us about what happened? How has the scandal and its aftermath changed American politics? And what on earth were these politicians thinking?
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If you’ve ever angrily deleted a fundraising email or text message, this episode is for you. Jaci and Charlie are both experts in campaign finance, and even they can barely believe the level of desperation, cringe and downright dishonesty they’ve seen in recent campaign fundraising asks. This week on Scandalized, we tackle the campaign finance system that got us here, and the increasingly embarrassing lengths politicians will go to separate you from your money.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
The Scandalized time machine is back up and running. This week, we’re headed back to 1876 to correct the record on the wildest presidential election outcome in American history. The contest between Rutherford B. Hayes and Samuel Tilden was undoubtedly close; but was it actually corrupt? Charlie and Jaci talk to the experts and get to the bottom of the “corrupt bargain” that wasn’t.
A transcript of this podcast is available.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
In the late 2010s, things went south – deep south – very quickly in Mississippi with a scandal fit for a football legend. This week on Scandalized, a network of political figures gets caught in misusing funds, but former NFL quarterback Brett Favre offers up the star power to turn it into a national scandal.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
A transcript of this podcast is available here.
President Donald Trump’s second term is littered with corruption scandals. But to kick off season 2, Charlie and Jaci give listeners a brief break from the man at the top, and dive deep on Trump’s top lieutenants, including in his cabinet.
In Trump’s first term, his advisors seemed content to play small ball with taxpayer dollars; but in the second term, influencer culture has taken the wrongdoing to new heights. This week on Scandalized: Scott Pruitt, Kash Patel, and what happens when the Executive Branch looks too much like the Executive Suite.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
Content Warning: cursing
Do you ever look at a politician explaining away some new scandal they got themselves into & think to yourself: how in the hell did we get here?
Political scandals can be exasperating, confusing and downright weird. On Season 1 of our podcast, we took our job seriously: to find the meaning in the madness. After two more years of political impropriety, we're back for Season 2.
On Scandalized, we spill the tea on some of our favorite scandals from across American history. But after we air all the dirty laundry, we chase it with a healthy dose of political science to help exlpain the hows and whys. Like: why do politicians do some of the ridiculous things they do? How do they handle the blowback? How on earth do they think they'll get away with it? New episodes drop every Monday, starting Oct. 5.
Ahead of our Season 2 debut, we're bringing you a special episode from our friends at Swing State of the Union, a podcast from WUWM, Milwaukee's NPR. Like Scandalized, Swing State of the Union takes you inside the stories behind American politics, exploring the people, issues and political forces shaping what happens next.
In this episode, opposition to data centers cuts across party lines, which is a rarity in Wisconsin politics. But who has the power to say whether a project is approved, or under what conditions?
This special presentation is part of the American Storytelling Collection, a collaboration from the NPR Network featuring some of public media's best narrative podcasts. This month, the collection celebrates stories of wilderness and the great outdoors.
After you listen, search for the American Storytelling Collection in the NPR App or on Apple Podcasts to discover even more great outdoor stories from across the NPR Network.
As a topper for our mini-season, we’re bringing you a live show we did earlier in 2025 from Treefort Music Fest in Boise! Charlie reminds Jaci about Howard Dean’s “scream heard ‘round the world," and Jaci schools Charlie on a big city mayor who might have been better off not writing a children’s book.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
In season one, we purposely avoided doing an episode about Donald Trump; but the first year of Trump’s second term is too scandalous to ignore. In this episode, we break down the new, the old, and the truly unprecedented of Trump’s second-term scandals. We cover Trump’s pardons for government insurrectionists and his questionable allies; his unprecedented financial entanglements with the office he holds; and, of course, the Epstein of it all.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
Charlie and Jaci revisit a couple of their favorite stories from season one, including fan favorites like Gov. Rod Blagojevich. We also talk exclusively with Gov. Sanford’s former chief of staff for an insider’s account of the “Appalachian Trail” scandal, and check in with new efforts to ban insider trading in Congress.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
The culinary journey continues with some more food fails in very public political spaces. A president gets sick in the lap of another head of state; Marco Rubio learns about the fine art of drinking from a water bottle; and two U.S. Senators school us on the finer points of hot dogs and tuna melts.
For more sources and bonus info on this episode, visit www.scandalizedpod.com.
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