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Weekly Spotlight: Add to Queue

In case you missed it, our award-winning investigative podcast Bad Watchdog returned for a second season this week.

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Editor’s Note: Weekly Spotlight is taking a brief summer vacation for the next few weeks. We will be back in your inbox on July 6, 2024.

In case you missed it, our award-winning investigative podcast Bad Watchdog returned for a second season this week. The first season took us to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), sharing a cautionary tale about what happens when the people responsible for holding our government accountable look the other way.

Season two brings us back to the DHS — this time, to examine how the agency is going about its foundational mission of protecting our nation from terrorism. What happens when one agency takes on both homeland security and immigration? And what happens in DHS detention centers, where people are held on the presumption that they may be national security threats?

Hosted by POGO Investigative Producer Maren Machles, the podcast draws the threads together from several POGO investigations that explore the state of DHS operations today.

The first two episodes of the podcast are out now, and you can listen to them on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.


 

PODCAST

Bad Watchdog S2 E1: The Red Herring

Established in the wake of September 11, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was entrusted with protecting the U.S. from national security threats. Since then, much of the agency’s focus has been on the southern border.

Read Now


 

PODCAST

Bad Watchdog S2 E2: The Hole

Host Maren Machles learns more about people’s experiences in ICE detention by talking with formerly detained activist Berto Hernandez and traveling to El Paso, Texas, to hear directly from people who were recently released from ICE facilities.

Read Now


 

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“The fact that foundation donors received special access to the secretary of state isn’t surprising, nor is the fall in foundation funding after her [Hillary Clinton] 2016 election loss, [I]t really looks like they were cozying up to who they thought was going to be the future president.”

Scott Amey, General Counsel, in CNN


 

OVERHEARD


 

ONE LINERS

“There is some progress, but it’s unclear how far it’s taken us.”

Katherine Hawkins, Senior Legal Analyst, in USA Today