Welcome to Law and Disorder Radio
Law and Disorder is a weekly independent civil liberties radio program airing on more than 150 stations and on Apple podcast. Law and Disorder provides timely legal perspectives on issues concerning civil liberties, privacy, right to dissent and practices of torture exercised by the US government and private corporations.
Law and Disorder November 17, 2025
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Socialist Democrat Voted Into NYC Mayoral Seat: What Happens Now?
Thirty-three year-old Zohran Mamdani, an immigrant from Uganda, a Muslim, and a member of the Democratic Socialist of American won an overwhelming victory in New York City’s primary in September’s and then won the mayoral race in New York City December 4. His team of some 100,000 door knockers and canvassers swept the charismatic Mamdani into first place over the former governor and main line Democrat Andrew Cuomo. Cuomo was supported financially and politically by 28 different billionaires, Wall Street, and the real estate interests. The top of the Democratic party refused to endorse Zohran even after he won the Democratic primary and recently Trump smeared Zohran as a “lunatic communist“ and has already cut off $18 billion of federal funding for the state of New York.
The victory of Mamdani and the magnificent movement behind him came after the No Kings demonstrations attended by millions across the country. It is the most significant development so far in the fight back against the oligarchs, authoritarians and fascists forces in the United States. The Mamdani success has changed the relationship of forces somewhat between the American people and their rulers like nothing we have seen since a huge rebellion against the Vietnam war in 1968. What are its implications for New York City and beyond, the growth and influence of socialist ideas and for the DSA?
Guest – Historian Paul LeBlanc, professor emeritus of history at LaRoche University in Pittsburgh and an active member of the Pittsburgh chapter of the DSA. He is the author of many books on socialism and labor history and most recently a contributor to A User’s Guide to the DSA with an article titled A Effective Force for Socialism.–
—-
Lawsuit Charges That California Law Illegally Muzzles Students and Teachers on Palestine
Beginning January 1, 2026, teachers in California classrooms will have to look over their shoulders to avoid running afoul of an alarming new “antisemitism” law. On October 7, despite widespread opposition from teachers’ unions, civil rights groups, and education advocates, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 715. It amends the California Education Code to police what teachers can teach and what students can learn about Israel and Palestine.
Under this law, teachers could be charged with unlawful discrimination and disciplined “if they expose their students to ideas, information, and instructional materials that may be considered critical of the State of Israel and the philosophy of Zionism,” according to a lawsuit filed on November 2 by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC).
Guest – Marjorie Cohn is Professor Emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, Dean of the People’s Academy of International Law, and former president of the National Lawyers Guild. She is a legal and political analyst who does media commentary and writes columns on Truthout and other outlets, and she a former host on Law and Disorder radio. Her most recent book is Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues. Marjorie wrote an article that was published earlier this month on Truthout, titled Lawsuit Charges That California Law Illegally Muzzles Students and Teachers on Palestine.
———————–
Law and Disorder November 10, 2025
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Worldwide, governments are quietly stockpiling one of the most intimate forms of personal data imaginable: our DNA. What began as a tool for identifying suspects and reuniting families has become a global infrastructure for surveillance—an invisible archive of our genetic code, stored and searchable.
In 2024, Georgetown Law’s Center on Privacy & Technology sounded the alarm in a report titled Raiding the Genome: How the United States Government Is Abusing its Immigration Powers to Amass DNA for Future Policing. The findings were stark: U.S. immigration authorities are collecting DNA on a massive scale, far beyond what the law permits.
In a follow-up report last month, the Center reveals that Customs and Border Protection is taking DNA from American citizens, too—routinely, without consent, and without oversight—then funneling those samples to the FBI. Once there, they’re added to the national criminal database known as CODIS, where law enforcement agencies nationally can access and search them.
Guest – Stevie Glaberson is the Director of Research & Advocacy for the Center, and an author of the report. She joined the Center after serving as a Visiting Professor and the Director of Georgetown Law’s Civil Litigation Clinic, which she helped found as a clinical teaching fellow and staff attorney.
—-
On October 18, No Kings Day, in her popular Newsletter, author Sarah Kendzior wrote a disturbing column titled Inventing Antifa. It begins: “In 2005, the Uzbek government invented a group called ‘Akromiya’ to justify a massacre of protesters. Now I worry the US government will do the same.” She recounted how on May 13, 2005, the Uzbek government killed over 700 civilians gathered in the eastern city of Andijon to protest the economic, social, and political conditions of Uzbekistan. Prompted by the imprisonment and subsequent jailbreak of popular local businessmen, the crowd grew to 10,000 people, some drawn by a rumor that their dictator, President Karimov, would address the largest protest in Uzbekistan’s history. Instead, military forces greeted the demonstrators. According to the Uzbek government, the forces targeted only armed insurgents, 187 of whom were killed. But according to nearly all other accounts, the military fired indiscriminately into the crowd, murdering at least 700 people, including children.
At the center of the massacre was a group the Uzbek government called “Akromiya.” According to the Uzbek government, Akromiya armed the militants, Akromiya gave the orders, Akromiya was responsible for the deaths of Uzbek citizens in Andijon. Akromiya was a menace that had to be stamped out at any cost. There was one problem with this theory: Akromiya — according to Uzbek and international human rights groups, political organizations, journalists, citizens, and accused Akromiya members themselves — did not exist. The Uzbek government had invented “Akromiya,” which became the all-purpose label slapped on any Uzbek who dared to dissent.
Kendzior believes that just as the Uzbek government invented the bogeyman “Akromiya” to justify the brutal suppression of dissent, Donald Trump is using the label Antifa to do the same to suppress and criminalize the rising resistance against his fascist regime in the United States. Kendzior knows alot about the myth of “Akromiya” because she’s the one who debunked it, so we’re very pleased to have her with us today on Law and Disorder.
Guest – Sarah Kendzior is the bestselling author of The View From Flyover Country, Hiding In Plain Sight and They Knew. Her latest book The Last American Road Trip was published this year and I had the pleasure of reviewing it – favorably I might add – for Ms Magazine. From 2018 until 2023, she was the co-host of Gaslit Nation, a weekly podcast and she is well-known for her coverage of the Trump administration and for writing about authoritarianism, kleptocracy, transnational organized crime, racism and xenophobia, media, voting rights, technology, the environment, and corruption, among other topics. Sarah holds a PhD in anthropology from Washington University in Saint Louis and an MA in Central Eurasian Studies from Indiana University In August 2013, Foreign Policy journal named her one of “the 100 people you should be following on Twitter to make sense of global events.” Inventing Antifa – Sarah Kendzior’s Newsletter.
——————————————
Law and Disorder November 3, 2025
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
We’re Coming for You and Your Whole Rotten System
Tens of thousands of socialists, union members, and working people fought alongside Kshama Sawant and her city council office to win historic victories, like the $15 an hour minimum wage, Amazon tax on businesses, renter rights and more. Long before AOC and Bernie Sanders became household names, Kshama won elections as a socialist to the office of city council in Seattle in 2013.
Twelve years ago the demand for $15 an hour was dismissed as utopian by the Democrats in Seattle and the corporate media. They won and moreover, they won an escalation clause. Seattle workers are now getting over $20 an hour, the highest in the country.
In 2020, her office won the historic Amazon tax which funds affordable housing and other needs to the tune of $214 million a year by taxing the city’s, wealthiest corporations. Sawant launched the people’s budget campaign, organizing hundreds of activists every year and winning millions of dollars in funding for affordable housing, renters needs, including defense against evictions, and social services.
They won a law after the Roe versus Wade decision making abortion free in Seattle for all those who need it. They won a resolution making Seattle the largest city to pass the strongest cease-fire resolution condemning Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people. Why is KShama and the forces around her been able to defeat big business interests, the right wing, and the Democratic Party establishment again and again whereas Bernie Sanders and the Squad have not?
Guest – Jonathan Rosenblum, the author of the recently published book We’re Coming for You and your Whole Rotten System to answer this question. Mr. Rosenblum worked on the Sawant’s staff at the Seattle City Council office throughout the decade of 2010s. He’s a journalist, labor organizer, and a member of the National Writers Union.
—-
Netflix Documentary and Innocence Project Help Exonerate Falsely Imprisoned Killers
The black political leader, Malcolm X was assassinated 50 years ago in the Audubon ballroom in Harlem, in the City of New York. Assassination is a political murder. The story that we were all to believe was that Malcolm X, as a member and leader of Elijah Muhammad’s nation of Islam, developed differences with Elijah Mohammad. That he left the nation of Islam. And that he was later killed by members of the NY and Newark chapters, who came across the Hudson River and shot him while he spoke out at the ballroom.
But as we have learned recently, that story is not the full truth. The truth started coming out when Netflix did a six-part documentary on the assassination. This was followed up by the work of the Innocence Project, who along with help from the Manhattan district attorney’s office got two of the falsely imprisoned supposed killers exonerated.
We have learned of the FBI’s intelligence program called Cointelpro. One of its aims was to neutralize any future black leaders. Malcolm X‘s daughters have retained a team of civil rights attorneys who are suing the New York Police Department and the FBI over their possible involvement in the assassination of Malcolm X, and it’s cover-up.
Guest – Flint Taylor of the Peoples Law Office. Taylor is a nationally recognized civil rights attorney. He represented the family of Fred Hampton demonstrating that the Chicago Police Department and the FBI were responsible for the assassination of the young Black Panther leader. He’s written the book “The Killing Machine: Racism and Police Violence in Chicago”. He is one of the editors of the “Police Misconduct Law Reporter. He’s the author of The Torture Machine: Racism And Police Violence In Chicago.
——————————–