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The Brian Lehrer Show — News
The Brian Lehrer Show

Brian Lehrer leads the conversation about what matters most now in local and national politics, our own communities and our lives.

Copyright: © WNYC

Latest Episodes:

Will Mayor Mamdani's Rent Guidelines Board Deliver the Rent Freeze? May 08, 2026

Show notes

David Brand, housing reporter for WNYC and Gothamist, talks about the Rent Guidelines Board's preliminary vote on rent regulations for about one million regulated apartments, and other housing news.
Photo: The Queensbridge public housing development in the neighborhood of Long Island City in Queens, New York, (NewYork 1956 at the English-language Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

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Where Western Leaders Went Wrong May 08, 2026

Show notes

Ian Shapiro, professor of political science and global affairs at Yale University, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of After the Fall: From the End of History to the Crisis of Democracy, How Politicians Broke Our World (Basic Books, 2026), traces the breakdown in democratic institutions to missteps by Western leaders following the fall of the Soviet Union.

Photo: US President George HW Bush (in grey suit) and Russian Federation President Boris Yeltsin (1931 - 2007) (in black suit) wave as they step off Marine One, Maryland, June 17, 1992. (Photo by Ron Sachs/CNP/Getty Images)

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The Emotional Labor of Mothers May 08, 2026

Show notes

Author Alva Gotby's book They Call it Love: The Politics of Emotional Life (Verso Books, 2023), coined the term emotional reproduction to describe the unseen and unappreciated labor involved in maintaining relationships that tends to fall on women in heterosexual pairings. For this Mother's Day, listeners call in to share how this concept appears in their lives and appreciate the emotional reproduction of the mothers in their lives.

Photo: A woman gives a child a hug. (Credit: Myles Grant/Wikimedia Commons BY CC 2.0)

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Why the Demise of Spirit Airlines is Bad For Consumers May 07, 2026

Show notes

Dean Seal, corporate news reporter for The Wall Street Journal, talks about how the Iran war and higher fuel prices were a major factor in the demise of Spirit Airlines, and how the budget carrier shutting down may mean higher fares across the board.
Photo: Author John Mckenna, CC BY 2.0. Public Domain

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Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg on the Decline in Crime, Remedying Wrongful Convictions, and More May 07, 2026

Show notes

Alvin Bragg, Manhattan district attorney, talks about recent work his office has done vacating wrongful convictions, a statistical decline in crime and more.

Photo: Alvin L. Bragg, Jr., the District Attorney of New York County photographed on Central Park West and 74th Street (CmdrDan, CC BY-SA 4.0), via Wikimedia Commons

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The Trump Administration vs. Smith College and The New York Times May 07, 2026

Show notes

Suzanne Goldberg, professor of law at Columbia Law School and co-founder of the school's Center for Gender and Sexuality Law, talks about the Trump administration's investigation of Smith College over its policy of admitting transgender students, plus the administration's lawsuit against The New York Times on behalf of a white man who is alleging the paper discriminated in their hiring practices.

Photo: A brick wall sign with SMITH COLLEGE stands before a stately building amidst lush green trees under a bright sky, capturing a serene campus entrance. (Credit: Brian Logan via Getty Images Plus)

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Shout Out Your Favorite Audiobook May 07, 2026

Show notes

Listeners call in to talk about the latest or best book they've listened to, plus discuss the types of books they prefer to listen to over read.

Photo: Stock image (Credit: mi-vector via Getty Creative)

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Call Your Senator: Sen. Andy Kim on Iran & Redistricting May 06, 2026

Show notes

Andy Kim, U.S. Senator (D NJ), talks about his work in the Senate and the issues in New Jersey, including the war with Iran and partisan redistricting in the Garden State and around the country.
Photo: US Senator Andy Kim (D-NJ). December 2024, Office of Senator Andy Kim U.S. Senate Photographic Studio, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

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Bellevue Hospital's Program for Torture Survivors Faces Closure May 06, 2026

Show notes

NYC Health and Hospitals announced plans to shut down a storied program at Bellevue Hospital that treats torture survivors, citing tenuous federal funding and the possibility of ICE raids at the hospital. Allen Keller, M.D., associate professor of medicine and population health at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and founder of Bellevue's Program for Survivors of Torture, and Ibrahim, former patient at Bellevue's Program for Survivors of Torture, discuss the impact of the program and why they're fighting to keep it open.

Photo: Bellevue Hospital - NYC (Credit: ajay_suresh via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0)

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Why U.S. Birth Rates Are Dropping May 06, 2026

Show notes

The U.S. fertility rate dropped to another record low in 2025, according to provisional CDC data, marking a 23% drop since 2007. Jill Filipovic, attorney and author of several books, including OK Boomer, Let's Talk: How My Generation Got Left Behind (Atria/One Signal Publishers, 2020), and Karen Guzzo, director of the Carolina Population Center and a sociology professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, explain what's behind the decline, the current Republican and far-right conservative policy plans to try and reverse those trends and what actually works to incentivize a growing population.

Photo: A doctor uses a hand-held Doppler probe on a pregnant woman to measure the heartbeat of the fetus on Dec. 17, 2021, in Jackson, Miss. (Credit: Rogelio V. Solis/AP)

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