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Renaldo Hudson and Liz Futrell from The Death Penalty Project join Mike for a sharp conversation on the future of capital punishment — including President Trump's plan to livestream the Ft. Hood execution, a state‑sanctioned killing spectacle. Renaldo brings lived experience as a death penalty survivor. Liz, the group's communications director, brings global abolition expertise. Together, they'll break down what this moment means for justice and democracy.

On this edition of Hitting Left we're joined by two legendary Chicago filmmakers — Floyd Webb and Peter Kuttner — artists whose work has shaped how this city tells its stories. Webb, known for his decades documenting Black Chicago's cultural and political life, and Kuttner, a longtime member of the Kartemquin collective, bring sharp eyes, sharp politics, and a deep commitment to community filmmaking.

Joining Mike on this edtion of Hitting Left is Marie Newman in a conversation focusing on Chicago politics, national stakes, and her personal political evolution as a progressive activist. Newman, who unseated conservative Democrat Dan Lipinski in the 2020 primary for Illinois's 3rd district, represents a shift away from long-held machine politics in southwest Chicago toward progressive priorities like abortion rights, gun control, and the Green New Deal.

Joining Mike in the Lumpen studio is Chicago Federation of Labor President Bob Reiter. This is a Labor Day conversation about power, organizing, and the future of Chicago's working class.

We're digging into sexual harassment inside Illinois politics, where power has a long habit of circling the wagons. In studio with us: Rep. Kelly Cassidy(R) and Alaina Hampton, two women who've forced this state to confront what it prefers to ignore.   We'll talk about the fallout from the Ex-Rep. Harry Benton findings, the political machinery that kept him protected, and the role of Speaker Chris Welch, whose handling of both the Benton matter and earlier misconduct allegations has become a fault line inside the Democratic Party in the middle of election season.

It's a family affair on this edition of Hitting Left as political strategist Joanna Klonsky and activist Fred Klonsky join Mike in a discussion of last Tuesday's Michigan election, Mamdani's New York, the troubles of the Democratic Party establishment, and the race for Chicago's mayor. Also, where's Andrew Cuomo?

Joining Mike on this edtion of the HItting Left podcast is former Chicago Mayor Lori LIghtfoot. Mike and Mayor Lightfoot talk WNBA basketball, recent MAGA attacks on LIghtfoot and her role in the fight against ICE.

Joining Mike is Flint Taylor, the Chicago attorney who co-founded the People's Law Office and who has spent fifty years putting the city's power structure on trial, from the killing of Fred Hampton to the CPD torture chambers run by Jon Burge. Flint is back on Hitting Left to talk about his new book, The Conviction Machine.

Mike is joined by researcher and writer Ben Lorber, whose work tracks the strange new alliances reshaping the American right — from Christian Zionists to the Gen‑Z 'America First' crowd — and what all this means for antisemitism, Palestine, and the future of Jewish politics."

This week on Hitting Left, Mike sits down with Michael Rabbitt and Joselyn Walsh, members of the Broadview 6, whose arrests during an anti‑ICE protest have become a flashpoint in Chicago's struggle for immigrant rights and the right to protest. They share their story and the broader stakes of resisting state violence.

Mike and Susan Klonsky are joined by Zayd Ayers Dohrn, playwright, screenwriter, and author of the new memoir Dangerous, Dirty, Violent & Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground. Dohrn's story cuts straight into the contradictions we talk about every week on Hitting Left — the collision of family, politics, violence, and repression, and the long shadow of American radicalism. His book traces what it meant to grow up inside the Weather Underground, navigating idealism, fear, privilege, and the costs of resistance in a country that still can't tell the truth about its own past.

Joining Mike  this week is the co-founder and trumpeter of the Grammy-winning klezmer group, the Klezmatics. The Klezmatics are a fiercely inventive New York klezmer band that fuses Jewish musical tradition with jazz, punk, folk, and political fire.

Joining Mike on May Day is Ivan Weiss, retired journalist, union organizer and the son of a Philadelpia family of McCarthy era political survivors. Now a small family farmer near Seattle, Wahington, Ivan shares with Mike family stories of life growing up during the notorious Red Scare and the lessons for today.

Jay Schaffner and Geoffrey Jacques join Mike to talk about their new volume, Red Lives: Our Years in the U.S. Communist Party (1950–2000).

Joining Mike in the Lumpen Radiio studio on this editon of Hitting Left are Shirin Vossoughi and Elham Hoominfar — two Northwestern scholars who bring depth, clarity, and a refusal to let Iran be reduced to headlines or talking points.