The Program in Law and Normative Thinking will host an episode of “Main Justice,” a podcast about the rule of law in the Second Trump Administration. An audience Q&A will follow the podcast recording.

Main Justice is the next era of legal analysis from Andrew Weissmann '80 and Mary McCord, the veteran lawyers behind the hit podcast Prosecuting Donald Trump. After the criminal cases against Trump wound down and he settled into the White House, Andrew and Mary have drawn on their extensive experience working with the Department of Justice to break down what’s happening inside Trump’s DOJ. Each week, they use their platform on Main Justice to safeguard against assaults on our laws, our Constitution, and our democracy.

Podcast taping, 4:30 to 5:30 PM

Audience Q&A, 5:30 to 6:30 PM

About the speakers

Andrew Weissmann ’80 is a Professor of Practice at NYU Law School, where he teaches courses in national security and criminal procedure. Weissmann served as a lead prosecutor in Robert S. Mueller’s Special Counsel’s Office (2017-19) and as Chief of the Fraud Section in the Department of Justice (2015-2019). From 2011 to 2013, he served as the General Counsel for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, having previously served as special counsel to then-Director Mueller in 2005 and, between stints in the US government, as a partner at Jenner & Block. From 2002-2005, he was the Deputy and then the Director of the Enron Task Force in Washington, D.C., where he supervised the prosecution of more than 30 individuals in connection with the company’s collapse. Weissmann was also a federal prosecutor for 15 years in the Eastern District of New York, where he served as the Chief of the Criminal Division, prosecuting numerous members of the Colombo, Gambino, and Genovese families, including the bosses of the Colombo and Genovese families.  As a Princeton undergraduate, Weissmann majored in History with a certificate in European Cultural Studies with a senior thesis on “Francois Poullain de la Barre, a Cartesian Feminist.” He received his JD from Columbia Law School.  

Mary McCord is Executive Director of the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection (ICAP) and a Visiting Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center. At ICAP, McCord leads a team that brings constitutional impact litigation at all levels of the federal and state courts across a wide variety of areas including First Amendment rights, immigration, criminal justice reform, and combating the rise of private paramilitaries.   McCord was the Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security at the U.S. Department of Justice from 2016 to 2017 and Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for National Security from 2014 to 2016.   Before that, McCord was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for nearly 20 years at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia. McCord is a statutorily designated amicus curiae for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review. McCord served as legal counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Task Force 1-6 Capitol Security Review appointed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi after the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.  McCord received the Oliver White Hill Courageous Advocate Award from the Virginia Trial Lawyers’ Association in 2018, based on her work with ICAP litigating against white supremacist and private militias that attended the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. She graduated from Georgetown University Law School and served as a law clerk for Judge Thomas Hogan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Both Weissmann and McCord are frequent commentators in the media, and their predecessor podcast, Prosecuting Donald Trump won the Webby Award for best podcast in the field of crime and justice in 2024 as well as the People’s Voice Winner 2024 for podcasts in that field.      

UCHV sponsorship of an event does not constitute institutional endorsement of the program, speakers, or views presented.