386. Elie Mystal with Jay Willis - How Overturning Laws Could Help America

386. Elie Mystal with Jay Willis - How Overturning Laws Could Help America

Author: Town Hall Seattle April 18, 2025 Duration: 1:15:21

Headshots of Elie Mystal (with brown skin, grey afro, eyeglasses) and Jay Willis (with fair skin, short brown hair)

Is there a current law on the books that you disagree with? How about ten?

In Bad Law: Ten Popular Laws That Are Ruining AmericaNew York Times bestselling author and legal analyst Elie Mystal argues not only that ten pieces of legislation are making life worse for millions of Americans but that they should be repealed completely.

On topics ranging from immigration to gun rights to abortion and religious freedom, Mystal asserts that these are the worst of our ordinances and that the laws by which our nation is governed do not always reflect the will of the people. Dissecting these laws through a critical lens, Mystal also addresses how these laws intersect with and impact race, class, gender, and other social identities.

Even though people in power made these laws, Mystal reasons that these laws can — and should — be unmade. Bad Law aims to examine the status quo and serve as a clarion call for future reform.

Elie Mystal is the New York Times bestselling author of Allow Me to Retort: A Black Guy's Guide to the Constitution (The New Press) as well as The Nation's legal analyst and justice correspondent, and the legal editor of the More Perfect podcast on the Supreme Court for Radiolab. He is an Alfred Knobler Fellow at Type Media Center, and a frequent guest on MSNBC and Sirius XM.

Jay Willis is a writer who covers courts, politics, and democracy. He is the editor-in-chief at Balls & Strikes, and was previously a staff writer at GQ magazine and a senior contributor to The Appeal. Before his journalism career, he practiced law at large firms in Washington, D.C. and Seattle.


Recorded live from a historic venue in the Pacific Northwest, the Town Hall Seattle Civics Series podcast brings the stage to your headphones. Each episode captures a vital conversation from Town Hall Seattle's ongoing programming, where experts, activists, and thinkers grapple with the ideas shaping our collective life. You’ll hear historians reframe our past, legal scholars dissect constitutional questions, and community organizers explain the mechanics of emerging movements. This isn't just theoretical discussion; it's a direct engagement with the policies and cultural shifts that touch our neighborhoods and the wider world. Tuning in feels like finding a seat in a thoughtful, often provocative public forum. The series operates on a belief that an informed community is an empowered one, and this audio archive makes that process accessible to anyone, anywhere. By focusing on the substance of live civic dialogue, this podcast provides the context and depth often missing from daily headlines, fostering a deeper understanding of how society functions and changes.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Town Hall Seattle Civics Series
Podcast Episodes
356. Dr. Rajiv Shah with Eric Liu: Charting a Course for Change [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:16:34
Ever wondered how a leader orchestrates large-scale change on a global scale? In his new book, Big Bets: How Large-Scale Change Really Happens, Rajiv J. Shah, President of the Rockefeller Foundation and former administra…
355. Barbara McQuade with Jenny Durkan: In Search of Truth [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:06:51
The subject of disinformation is a well-known part of political rhetoric, but it has implications even outside of the sphere of democracy. From the electoral system to schools; from the workplace to hospitals, the conseq…
354. Michael J. Gerhardt: The Law of Presidential Impeachment [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:09
Have you ever wondered how impeachment really works? As a witness and consultant in the impeachment trials of Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, legal scholar Michael J. Gerhardt has collected a lifetime of scholarly researc…
352. Boldt at 50 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:20:50
Commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Boldt Decision, a pivotal moment in civil rights history and tribal sovereignty. Centered around Charles Wilkinson's posthumously acclaimed work, Treaty Justice, a panel will discu…
351. Ijeoma Oluo with Michele Storms: Be a Revolution [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:28:07
Ijeoma Oluo's #1 New York Times bestseller So You Want To Talk About Race (book tour event at Town Hall in 2019), offered a vital guide for how to talk about important issues of race and racism in society. In Mediocre: T…
350. Tamara Payne with Glenn Hare: The Life and Legacy of Malcolm X [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:10:35
In 1990, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Les Payne embarked on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to interview anyone he could find who had actually known Malcolm X. His goal was ambitious: to transform what…
349. Tim Schwab with Ashley Fent: The Problem with Philanthropy [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:28:48
Journalist Tim Schwab is no stranger to investigative journalism that scrutinizes power structures and questions how private interests intersect with public policy. With funding from a 2019 Alicia Patterson Fellowship, S…
348. Ganesh Sitaraman with Paul Constant: Why is Flying so Miserable? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 49:16
It is among the most classically joked about modern grievances, air travel. Between flight cancellations, delays, lost baggage, increased prices, crammed planes, and the general downtrodden gloom that accompanies flying,…
347. Betty Houchin Winfield: Pioneering Women in Academia [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 53:11
Starting in 1967, when fewer than 1% of women completed any education beyond four years of college, the Washington State University (WSU) Sociology Department dared to hire three female faculty members who became lifelon…