Opening Arguments

Latest Episodes:

Stephen Miller Is Just Having People Killed Now Oct 03, 2025

Show notes

OA1195 - How much of the federal government has actually shut down, and why? We explore the truth behind the spin, and Matt breaks the exclusive story of how at least one part of the executive branch appears to be illegally operating at full capacity.

We then then connect some of the most fast-moving stories of the past few weeks to bring out the terrifying relationship between the obvious legal issues around the Trump administration’s threats to invade Venezuela, underreported executive actions on “Antifa” and “domestic terrorism” and their broad potential consequences, and the Trump’s recent threat to use US cities as “training grounds” for US troops.

Then: good news! Jenessa shares a win on voting rights out of Pennsylvania, and Matt celebrates a resounding victory for the free speech rights of non-citizen students like Rumeysa Ozturk and Mahmoud Khalil from a Reagan-appointed federal judge. Finally, today’s footnote confirms that the Wu Tang Clan is as a matter of law indeed nothing to fuck with.

“Stephen Miller takes leading role in strikes on alleged Venezuelan drug boats,” The Guardian (9/29/2025)
“Designating Cartels And Other Organizations As Foreign Terrorist Organizations And Specially Designated Global Terrorists” – The White House (1/20/2025)
“Invocation of the Alien Enemies Act Regarding the Invasion of The United States by Tren De Aragua” – The White House (3/15/2025)
“Designating Antifa as a Domestic Terrorist Organization” – The White House (9/22/2025)
“Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence,” The White House (9/25/2025)
Boston senior federal judge William Young’s order in AAUP v. Rubio (9/30/2025)
Memorandum & Order Granting and denying parts of Martin Shkreli’s motion to dismiss in PleasrDAO v. Shkreli (9/25/2025):

Take It From Two Defense Attorneys - DO NOT TALK TO THE COPS Sep 29, 2025

Show notes

OA1194 - NY defense attorney Liz Skeen joins to talk about the evolution (or devolution?) or our Miranda rights in the past several decades. How does an actual criminal defense attorney who deals with these issues every day think about them?

Could Tylenol Sue Trump and RFK Jr. for Libel? Sep 26, 2025

Show notes

OA1193 - Could Tylenol sue RFK Jr. for libel? Does the pressure the FCC put on Disney/ABC to fire Jimmy Kimmel constitute a First Amendment violation? Is the Trump administration really going to charge rural hospitals $100,000 for the privilege of being able to hire foreign doctors? In today’s Rapid Response Friday we answer all of these recent patron questions and more, and Jenessa shares a personal footnote about her decision to voluntarily take the most specialized bar exam in the US legal system.

The Campaign for Accountability’s bar complaint against FCC chairman Brendan Carr
Restriction on Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers, (Presidential Proclamation dated 9/20/2025)
US Patent and Trademark Office bar registration page

HBO released a new Adnan Syed doc episode and it is shockingly dishonest Sep 24, 2025

Show notes

We watched the newly-released final episode of HBO’s The Case Against Adnan Syed, and we have questions. Are the producers really trying to pin the murder of Hae Min Lee on a Black man with obvious mental health issues who was already cleared as a suspect--and did they really need to show the world a fully-nude photo of him to make that case? What is the story that they are trying to tell here, and just how far off is it from the truth? From the libelously deceptive cold open to the slyly deceptive summary of Syed’s post-Serial legal proceedings and beyond, Matt brings his post-conviction expertise to make the case against The Case Against Adnan Syed.

FOOTNOTES

SIO354: “Serial's Adnan Syed Conviction Reinstated--What Happened? (w/Matt Cameron) (4/4/2023)
OA1067: “Adnan Syed Remains a Convicted Murderer” (9/9/2024)
State’s Attorney Ivan Bates’s memorandum in support of his Motion to Withdraw the previously-filed Motion to Vacate Judgment
85-page Court of Appeals decision in Lee v. State reinstating Adnan Syed’s conviction (3/28/2023)
State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby’s Sep 14, 2022 motion to vacate Adnan Syed’s conviction
Judge Phinn’s September 19, 2022 order on motion to vacate
Attorney General Brian Frosh’s statement re: SA Mosby’s motion to vacate
Attorney General’s fiery response to Adnan Syed’s motion to disqualify AG’s office from representing the state of Maryland in this appeal
More on the feud between the Attorney General and Baltimore City State’s Attorney over the Adnan Syed conviction: “Maryland AG questions integrity of process used to exonerate Adnan Syed,” Maryland Daily Record (10/25/2022)
Full transcription of prosecutor’s handwritten note which Mosby alleged constituted Brady evidence and more information in this Baltimore Banner story: “Was Adnan Syed Note Misinterpreted?” Baltimore Banner, (11/1/2022)
Appellant Young Lee’s brief in Lee v. State
Defendant Adnan Syed’s brief in Lee v. State
2019 Court of Appeals decision finding ineffective assistance of prior counsel in Adnan Syed’s case, but not enough prejudice to justify a new trial: State v. Syed :: 2019 :: Maryland Court of Appeals Decisions

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KATZ RULES EVERYTHING AROUND ME Sep 22, 2025

Show notes

OA1192 - This week in Still Good Law: Katz v. U.S., the 1967 Warren Court case which on its face decided that the Fourth Amendment may apply to a public phone booth. But that’s hardly all: the federal prosecution of nationally-famous bookie Charles Katz also completely changed the entire framework for how U.S. courts understand and interpret the law of searches and seizures and completely upended the concept of Fourth Amendment privacy as it had been understood up until that time. Matt provides the background on Katz and how this case made it to the Supreme Court, Jenessa considers the mental health benefits of being left alone by the government, and we talk through how important this vital holding might still be at a time when we have all given up so many of our privacy rights just by living in 2025.

Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do!

The Kirkstag Fire Sep 19, 2025

Show notes

OA1191 - In today’s Rapid Response Friday, we examine some of the legal questions raised as the Trump administration throws as much political capital as possible behind the recent assassination of Turning Point USA leader Charlie Kirk and their implications for the future of the First Amendment rights they claim to revere Kirk for championing. Is there any legal basis for Trump to designate a “domestic terrorist group,” let alone one that even his FBI has previously admitted doesn’t exist? Matt looks back to the first Trump term to try to understand what is coming. We then examine how the states are getting around the FDA’s limitations on the COVID-19 vaccine and the latest in Trump’s litigious war on the media before closing things out with a fun footnote on the only other time in US history that a US President has sued someone for libel.

Independent media matters more than ever now that mainstream media is compromised beyond any ability to report the truth about this administration. Support the show, join the community, and enjoy bonus content and ad-free listening at patreon.com/law! Don't forget to leave a 5-star review and share the show with your friends!

Tyler Robinson indictment (filed 9/16/2025)
18 USC 2331 (federal definition of “domestic terrorism”)
“Memorandum on Inadmissibility of Persons Affiliated with Antifa Based on Organized Criminal Activity” (1/5/2021)
“Documents Show Trump Officials Used Secret Terrorism Unit to Question Lawyers at the Border,” Dara Lind, ProPublica (5/14/2021)
“Migrant Caravan in Tijuana with ties to El Paso Texas,” DHS Field Information Report (10/18/2019)
“Trump v. New York Times Company” (complaint filed 9/15/2025)

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Charlie Kirk sucked and we won't be pretending otherwise Sep 17, 2025

Show notes

VR 7 - Part 1 of 2. Vapid Response Wednesday has been blessed with a surplus of truly awful takes in the days following the murder of MAGA luminary Charlie Kirk. After a brief reminder of who this man actually was in his own words, we go on to see who has achieved honors in categories ranging from Worst Obituary to Most Pretentious Response and beyond. (Next up: more of the worst, but also some of the best responses to this moment.)

You can also watch this episode on YouTube!

Part 2 is available exclusively on YouTube and Patreon!

“Charlie Kirk: The American Socrates,” Owen Anderson, The Blaze (9/14/25)
“Je Suis Charlie Kirk,” The Editors, The Free Press (9/12/25)
“Charlie Kirk’s Assassination Should Herald the End of the American Left,” John Daniel Davidson, The Federalist (9/12/25)
“He May Have Pulled the Trigger But Charlie Kirk’s Suspected Killer Didn’t ‘Act Alone’,” M.D. Kittle, The Federalist (9/12/25)
“We must not posthumously sanitize Charlie Kirk’s hateful life," Erin Reed, The Advocate (9/11/25)
“Charlie Kirk’s Legacy Deserves No Mourning,” Elizabeth Spiers, The Nation (9/12/25)

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To support the show (and lose the ads!), please pledge at patreon.com/law!

Miranda v. Arizona, and the Fascinating Science of False Confessions Sep 15, 2025

Show notes

OA1190 - “You have the right to remain silent.” Anyone who grew up on American crime dramas can recite the rest of these famous warnings from memory, but do you know the whole story of Miranda v. Arizona (1966)? In today’s entry in our “Still Good Law” series Matt and Jenessa voluntarily waive their rights, cautiously accept a cigarette and a Styrofoam cup of bad coffee from an alcoholic cop with a dark past, and spill everything they know about the most important criminal case in Supreme Court history. Matt provides the background on Ernesto Miranda’s literal life (and death) of crime and the circumstances of his arrest, interrogation, and appeal to the Warren Court while Jenessa breaks down the science of false confessions and why not just having but knowing our Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights is so important for all of us.

Oral arguments and decision in Miranda v. Arizona (1966)
Miranda: The Story of America’s Right to Remain Silent, Gary Stuart (2008)

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To support the show (and lose the ads!), please pledge at patreon.com/law!

It’s Still the Shadow Docket, Despite Kavanaugh’s Pathetic Rebrand Attempt Sep 12, 2025

Show notes

OA1189 - The Supreme Court’s next term may not start until October, but their infamous shadow--sorry, “interim”--docket is in rare form as they issue snap decisions on everything from exactly where one 14-year-old boy can pee to just how openly racist ICE gets to be. Matt and Jenessa review which major precedents the conservative majority is ignoring to enable Trump’s worst policies this week before getting on to some Epstein-related legal updates and a radical new development from the Board of Immigration Appeals with massive implications for Trump’s mass deportation plans.

Finally, Matt drops a footnote to address one of our nation’s least pressing legal questions: is it really true that a wedding in Kentucky can be legally officiated by a dead bear once described as “filled to the brim with cocaine”?

SCOTUS order in Trump v. Slaughter (9/8/2025)
SCOTUS order (with Kavanaugh concurrence and Sotomayor dissent) in Noem v. Vasquez-Perdomo (9/8/25)
Matter of Yajure Hurtado, 21 I&N 216 (BIA 2025)
Kentucky Revised Statute 402.070

P.S. Matt messed up his audio and is very sorry about it!

LAM1009: My Cousin Vinny Sep 11, 2025

Show notes

Just because everything else is terrible out there right now, we treated ourselves to our second consecutive Law’d Awesome Movie. By popular patron demand: it’s My Cousin Vinny! We had a great time talking about this one. Actual New York Italian-American Jenessa Seymour joins to provide dead-ass balls accurate cultural context for one of the greatest Brooklyn couples ever put to film, and Matt shares his perspective as both an actual practicing courtroom lawyer and a guy who is weirdly obsessed with end credits songs that tell you about the movie you just watched.

Thanks again to patrons for this one!