Why Is This Happening? with Chris Hayes

What does Amazon want from us? For consumers, Amazon can be a frictionless gateway to find everything from bed frames to dog food, baby clothes to award winning original tv series. There’s nothing quite like it – a position they’re in not by accident but by design. Amazon became the behemoth we know it to be by targeting and absorbing any competition, leveraging favorable government treatment, and picking winners and losers in the marketplace. But there’s much more they’re doing behind the scenes, including deals they’ve made with the CIA, the Pentagon, and more. Stacy Mitchell joins us to tell us what's on the other side of the bargain we’ve made in exchange for convenience. Email us at WITHpod@gmail.com Tweet using #WITHpod Read more at  released May 29

What was so bad about NAFTA? If you ask the President, it was one of the worst deals ever made. A common 2016 campaign riff was him promising to bring jobs back, get companies to return production to the U.S., and scrap NAFTA. This anti-trade campaigning caught the attention of many voters struggling to find work. Interestingly, it also got the attention of progressive trade critics on the left who had also been calling to renegotiate NAFTA for decades. Lori Wallach, Director at Public Citizen’s Global Trade, explains how their critique of corporate-rigged trade policies managed to align in some surprising ways with the President’s nationalist trade agenda. And while NAFTA 2.0 shows some progress, there are still a lot of improvements they want to see made. But that was only the beginning, ‘phase 1’ as Wallach puts it. Now, it has to be chewed over by a newly Democratic House and phase 2 begins. Email us at WITHpod@gmail.com Tweet using #WITHpod Read more at 

How can Democrats win in deep red America? During the midterms, momentum behind progressive candidates in red states garnered national attention – Beto O’Rourke in Texas, Andrew Gillum in Florida, and Stacey Abrams in Georgia. These were no overnight successes. They were the culmination of, among many things, the tireless efforts of grass roots organizers. Organizers like George Goehl, Director of People’s Action, who is focusing his efforts on white rural America. Hear how his own story of poverty and addiction helped inform how he works to build across race and place in order to lay the groundwork for radical change.  Email us at WITHpod@gmail.com Tweet using #WITHpod Read more at  by Saul Alinsky

You asked, Chris answered! In our inaugural mailbag episode, we talk about the organizing power of county fairs, why members of Congress contradict each other on Yemen, whether there’s any hope for the Internet, and more. Can you guess which WITHpod revelation Chris thinks is the most shocking yet? Also, the first ever appearance of WITHpod producer Tiffany Champion. EPISODES WE TALKED ABOUT by Eric Klinenberg

Listen for a couple of WITHpod announcements! Since his first day in office, Donald Trump has been testing the boundaries of the law on multiple fronts. From his open hostility towards the investigation into his campaign’s involvement with a foreign adversary, to his policy prescriptions by way of executive order, to the way Donald Trump runs his own White House, this President has challenged the rule of law like no other recent President. So, in the case of Donald Trump v. the Law – who’s winning? And what can we learn from what’s happened so far? In this episode Chris gets answers from Kate Shaw, a law professor from the Cardozo School of Law who has worked in both the White House and the Supreme Court, and who also happens to be his wife. It also happened to be her birthday on the day this was recorded, and yes, that came up. Email us at WITHpod@gmail.com Tweet using #WITHpod Read more at