'What Were We Thinking,' Trump Inc., Supreme Court Updates, Midcentury Drawings

Whether or not Donald Trump is elected for a second term, he is a man who has dominated national conversation -- and media coverage -- for the past four years. Pulitzer-Prize winning book critic for The Washington Post, Carlos Lozada, has spent those years reading just about every book written about President Donald Trump and his administration and cultural impact. He draws on over 150 recent volumes for his new book, What Were We Thinking: A Brief Intellectual History of the Trump Era, which includes myriad cultural observations and conclusions about the 45th president.

Journalists and Trump Inc. hosts Andrea Bernstein and Ilya Marritz join us to discuss the Trump campaign’s newly filed voting lawsuits, the major themes that have emerged from their years investigating the Trump administration, and the legacy his government will leave behind.

All eyes will be on the Supreme Court in the coming weeks. President Trump said on Wednesday morning that he would go to the Supreme Court. Before Election Day, the Court issued decisions affecting the process of counting ballots in key states, including North Carolina and Pennsylvania. And the Court has started its term, hearing oral arguments in cases this week. Jami Floyd, the WNYC newsroom's Legal Editor and Senior Editor for WNYC's Race and Justice Unit, joins us for a look at what role the courts have been playing in the election -- and the cases on the Court's docket, including a case challenging the Affordable Care Act, which they'll hear next week.

At this critical moment in American history, we turn to some of our greatest thinkers. This week, we air three essays commissioned as part of PEN America’s We Will Emerge project, a collection of essays speaking directly to voters around the country in advance of the US election.  The authors read the essays in their own voice. Today, we air an excerpt of an essay from Jean Guerrero, award-winning investigative journalist and author of Hatemonger: Stephen Miller, Donald Trump and the White Nationalist Agenda. Her essay is titled “Your Mestizaje is a Superpower.”

Curator Samantha Friedman joins us to discuss a new exhibit at MoMA called Degree Zero: Drawing at Midcentury, which opens November 1. The exhibition features almost 80 rare drawings by well-known artists, including Louise Bourgeois, De Kooning, Giacometti, and Matisse and places them in conversation with drawings by other artists working during the same time period in the aftermath of WWII, like Nigerian artist Uche Okeke, Brazillian painter Alfredo Volpi, and Korean artist Joong Seop Lee.