Episodes

Purple Political Breakdown host Radell Lewis and co-hosts Elijah and Danny break down the biggest political stories of the week in this Socratic Breakdown open panel. The U.S.-Iran conflict continues to escalate as oil prices spike, peace deals collapse, and troops from the 82nd Airborne deploy toward a potential Kharg Island invasion, all while Trump questions NATO membership over European allies refusing to cooperate. The Supreme Court deliberates on birthright citizenship and the 14th Amendme...

xxxxxxxxxxxHost Radell Lewis breaks down the biggest stories shaping America right now on the Purple Political Breakdown. This week: the U.S. Iran war enters its fourth week with ceasefire negotiations stalled over the Strait of Hormuz, nuclear threats, and rising gas prices. The DHS partial shutdown has pushed TSA call out rates past 11% nationally, with airports in Houston, Atlanta, and Baltimore hit hardest. Is Supreme Court reform finally on the table? Radell dives deep into court packing, t...

What is going on in Ohio? In this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis breaks down the biggest stories coming out of the Ohio Statehouse heading into the 2026 midterm elections. President Trump is calling for an end to no-excuse mail-in voting nationwide, and Ohio officials from both parties are responding. The Ohio House is advancing new abortion restrictions under House Bill 347, testing the limits of the 2023 constitutional amendment that 57 percent of voters approved. Ohi...

Should Democrats punish MAGA when they regain power, or should they focus on fixing what's broken? On this Socratic Breakdown, Radell Lewis and Elijah dive into one of the most heated debates in progressive politics right now: accountability versus retaliation. With Democrats winning surprise special elections in Florida and the 2026 midterms on the horizon, the question of how to handle the Trump era looms large. Radell breaks down the difference between government overreach (like the Stephen C...

Are Americans too cynical to recognize when government actually works? Radell Lewis sits down with David Martin, host and producer of The Good Government Show, to explore the stories of public servants and local leaders making real differences across the country. From a recidivism program in Berks County, Pennsylvania that dropped reoffending rates from 60% to just 5%, to micro loans helping small business owners grow, to rural hospitals reopening in communities that desperately need them, David...

Radell Lewis breaks down the biggest stories in American politics right now on this week's Purple Political Breakdown live show. The U.S. and Israeli war on Iran has entered its third week with 13 American service members dead, 200 troops wounded across seven countries, and oil prices surging toward $180 per barrel. Joe Kent, Trump's own counterterrorism director, resigned over the war, calling it unjustified, and then appeared on Tucker Carlson's podcast to insinuate Israel may have been involv...

Radell Lewis sits down with Jerrad Christian, Democratic candidate for Ohio's 12th Congressional District, for a conversation about the issues hitting Ohioans hardest right now. From the gerrymandering compromise that reshaped Ohio's congressional map to the property tax crisis squeezing homeowners and retirees, no topic is off limits. Jerrad grew up in rural Appalachian Ohio in a working poor family where government programs were not abstract policy debates but the difference between eating...

Radell Lewis breaks down the resignation of Joe Kent, former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who publicly stated that Iran posed no imminent threat and that the US was pressured into war by Israel and its powerful American lobby. Radell and Danny explore the responses from AIPAC, J Street, and the ADL, along with Mitch McConnell's controversial statement lumping isolationists and anti-Semites together (despite isolationism being a core MAGA pillar). The conversation dives into ...

What if there were 10 issues that the overwhelming majority of Americans already agree on, but Congress refuses to act on? That is exactly what Seven Ten (seventen.org) was built to address. In this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis sits down with Joe Patterson, the director of Seven Ten, a nonpartisan, nonprofit pro-democracy organization designed to unclog Congress by focusing exclusively on issues with 70% or more supermajority support. Joe breaks down the full list of...

The Iran war just got real. Radell Lewis breaks down the mounting U.S. casualties, the cruise missile strike on a girls' elementary school that the administration lied about, and why 2,500 Marines are now headed to the Arabian Sea. Oil just surged past $120 a barrel, the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed, and analysts are warning this conflict could trigger a full recession. Meanwhile, Anthropic refused to let the Pentagon use its AI for autonomous weapons and mass surveillance, so the admi...

Who will represent Cincinnati in Congress? In this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis breaks down every candidate running in Ohio's 1st Congressional District, one of the most closely watched toss-up House races in the country heading into the May 5, 2026 primary. After Ohio's October 2025 redistricting pushed the district further into conservative territory, incumbent Democrat Greg Landsman now faces a tougher path to reelection. Radell covers Landsman's bipartisan record...

Radell Lewis and the PPB panel break down the escalating US conflict with Iran, including American casualties, Tomahawk missile strikes, oil tanker attacks in the Strait of Hormuz, France deploying a frigate, and Iran's new leadership. The panel examines what Lindsey Graham and Netanyahu's warnings about the "next two weeks" could mean, from the MOAB to US-trained Kurdish ground forces entering western Iran. The conversation shifts to AI in warfare after the Trump administration sought autono...

On this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis delivers a comprehensive, nonpartisan deep dive into the coordinated campaign to reshape American elections before the 2026 midterms. Radell breaks down the SAVE America Act the Republican-backed voter ID and proof-of-citizenship bill that passed the House 218-213 and explains how its requirements could block more than 21 million eligible American citizens from registering to vote, disproportionately impacting married women, young ...

Radell Lewis breaks down the biggest stories shaping America this week on Purple Political Breakdown Political Solutions Without Political Bias. Operation Epic Fury enters its sixth day as U.S. and Israeli forces continue airstrikes on Iran following the killing of Supreme Leader Khamenei, with over 2,000 targets struck, Iranian retaliation across the Middle East, and more than 1,000 civilian casualties reported. Oil prices are surging toward $90 a barrel as the Strait of Hormuz becomes a flashp...

Your morning coffee may come with a side of modern slavery, child labor, and mass deforestation and it only costs 2-3 cents more per cup to fix it. In this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis sits down with Etelle Higonnet, founder and director of Coffee Watch, Yale Law School graduate, and internationally recognized human rights attorney who has been knighted by the French government for her pioneering work to curb deforestation in high-risk commodity industries. With exper...

Radell Lewis sits down with Anthony Campbell, Republican candidate for Ohio's 9th Congressional District, to break down his ABC plan for affordable healthcare, energy independence, and community-first representation. Campbell, a Sandusky native with over a decade in the healthcare industry, makes his case for why he can unseat longtime incumbent Marcy Kaptur where previous challengers have failed. They dig into healthcare reform and reducing administrative costs, renewable energy and grid modern...

Welcome to another Socratic Breakdown on the Purple Political Breakdown, hosted by Radell Lewis political solutions without political bias. This week, Radell is joined by panelists Danny and Elijah to unpack the escalating U.S.-Iran war and the collapse of Trump's "no new wars" promise. The panel breaks down Operation Epic Fury, the killing of Ayatollah Khamenei, and why the Trump administration can't get its own messaging straight with Rubio contradicting Hegseth, and Trump contradicting both....

Netflix just walked away from an $82.7 billion deal for Warner Bros and that's not the story. The real story is who's about to control your news. On this Research on a Dime segment of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis exposes how the Paramount-Skydance acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery is shaping up to be one of the most dangerous media consolidations in American history and why Trump's fingerprints are all over it. David Ellison, son of Oracle billionaire and Trump megadonor Lar...

In this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis sits down with Dr. Bernd Reiter, political scientist and Professor of LusoLatin American Studies at Texas Tech University, for a wide-ranging conversation about the crisis of representative democracy, extreme wealth inequality, and what it would actually take to fix America's political system. Dr. Reiter brings a unique international lens to American politics. Born and raised in Germany, he's lived and researched across Colombia...

On this Nuance News edition of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis covers the stories flying under the radar that you absolutely need to know about. The Supreme Court struck down Trump's tariffs as illegal and now states are demanding refunds worth billions. The Epstein saga just got darker: a DOJ internal email referred to Epstein's death as a murder, not a suicide, while the Department of Justice was caught tracking which members of Congress searched specific names in unredacted file...

The United States and Israel just launched a coordinated military assault on Iran and everything changed overnight. On this episode of Purple Political Breakdown, host Radell Lewis breaks down Operation Epic Fury and Operation Roaring Lion, the reported killing of Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran's retaliatory strikes on US bases and Gulf states, and what regime change rhetoric from Trump and Netanyahu actually means. Radell gives his honest, nonpartisan analysis on whether this was justified or another...

Host Radell Lewis breaks down everything you need to know about Ohio's 9th Congressional District heading into the 2026 midterms. After the Ohio Redistricting Commission redrew the map to lean Republican by over 10 points, longtime incumbent Marcy Kaptur the longest-serving woman in congressional history faces her toughest reelection yet. Radell goes candidate by candidate through the crowded GOP primary field: Derek Merrin (Trump-endorsed, 2024 rematch candidate), Madison Sheehan (former ICE de...

Host Radell Lewis and panelist Elijah break down the biggest stories shaping American politics right now. Is Gavin Newsom positioning himself as the 2028 Democratic frontrunner and are MAGA's racism accusations against him just manufactured outrage? We dig into Newsom's shifting stance on trans rights and sports, why Hasan Piker saying he'd vote third party over JD Vance is dangerously misguided, and what JD Vance's connections to Curtis Yarvin and Peter Thiel reveal about the real power behind ...

Purple Political Breakdown host Radell Lewis sits down with Adam Swart, founder and CEO of Crowds on Demand the country's largest protest and advocacy firm for an eye-opening conversation about the state of protesting in America. With ICE protests dominating headlines and tensions escalating between civilians and law enforcement, this episode delivers the insight you need right now. Adam brings over a decade of experience organizing high-profile protests and advocacy campaigns across the politi...