Slow Burn: Plus

Slow Burn illuminates America’s most consequential moments, making sense of the past to better understand the present. Through archival tape and first-person interviews, the award-winning series uncovers the surprising events and little-known characters lurking within the biggest stories of our time.


Season 8: Becoming Justice Thomas

Where Clarence Thomas came from, how he rose to power, and how he’s brought the rest of us along with him, whether we like it or not. Winner of the Podcast of the Year at the 2024 Ambies Awards.


Season 7: Roe v. Wade

The women who fought for legal abortion, the activists who pushed back, and the justices who thought they could solve the issue for good. Winner of Apple Podcasts Show of the Year in 2022.


Season 6: The L.A. Riots

How decades of police brutality, a broken justice system, and a video tape set off six days of unrest in Los Angeles.


Season 5: The Road to the Iraq War

Eighteen months after 9/11, the United States invaded a country that had nothing to do with the attacks. Who’s to blame? And was there any way to stop it?


Season 4: David Duke

America’s most famous white supremacist came within a runoff of controlling Louisiana. How did David Duke rise to power? And what did it take to stop him?


Season 3: Biggie and Tupac

How is it that two of the most famous performers in the world were murdered within a year of each other—and their killings were never solved?


Season 2: The Clinton Impeachment

A reexamination of the scandals that nearly destroyed the 42nd president and forever changed the life of a former White House intern.


Season 1: Watergate

What did it feel like to live through the scandal that brought down President Nixon?

History
Documentary
Politics
1
Announcing Slow Burn Season 9
Gays Against Briggs
1 min
2
Becoming Justice Thomas | 4+. The Epicenter of ...
An interview with Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick and Mark Joseph Stern on Thomas’ jurisprudence.
60 min
3
Becoming Justice Thomas | 4. A National Disgrace
What if Anita Hill hadn’t been the only woman who testified against Clarence Thomas?
61 min
4
Becoming Justice Thomas | 3+. The Man in the Mask
More from Slow Burn’s interview with Lillian McEwen, a former girlfriend of Clarence Thomas.
40 min
5
Becoming Justice Thomas | 3. I’m Their Guy
To understand who Clarence Thomas was in the 1980s, you need to hear from the women who knew him best.
51 min
6
Becoming Justice Thomas | 2+. The Path to Black...
More from Slow Burn’s interview with Leah Wright Rigueur, the author of The Loneliness of the Black Republican.
55 min
7
Becoming Justice Thomas | 2. Smiling Faces
Racial preferences gave Clarence Thomas a leg up. They also made him feel degraded.
45 min
8
Becoming Justice Thomas | 1+. "One of the Guys"
More from Slow Burn’s interview with Diane Brady, the author of Fraternity, which tells the story of Clarence Thomas’ college years.
48 min
9
Becoming Justice Thomas | 1. America’s Blackest...
How Clarence Thomas went from an aspiring priest to a campus radical.
49 min
10
Show of the Year Extra: What’s Next For Women
Bonus material from Apple Podcasts' Show of the Year.
26 min
11
Show of the Year Extra: Laughable
Bonus material from Apple Podcasts' Show of the Year.
20 min
12
Show of the Year Extra: The Court: Then & Now
Bonus material from Apple Podcasts' Show of the Year.
30 min
13
Show of the Year Extra: The Lawbreaker
Bonus material from Apple Podcasts' Show of the Year.
13 min
14
Show of the Year Extra: The Pivot
Bonus material from Apple Podcasts' Show of the Year.
23 min
15
Roe v. Wade | 5. Creating a Winning Show
The team behind Slow Burn: Roe v. Wade reveals how they made Apple Podcasts' Show of the Year.
45 min
16
Roe v. Wade | 4+. Could a Different Roe v. Wade...
All the theories about alternate decisions add up to the same fundamental problem.
45 min
17
Roe v. Wade | 4. Roe Against Wade
How Justice Harry Blackmun became an accidental abortion rights hero.
58 min
18
Roe v. Wade | 3+. How Abortion Access in Your S...
And what pro-choice people can do to help.
57 min
19
Roe v. Wade | 3. Women vs. Connecticut
What it took to strike down one of the oldest abortion laws in the country.
47 min
20
Roe v. Wade | 2+. How the Anti-Abortion Movemen...
By the 1990s, white Evangelicals and Catholics finally found ways to successfully push their agenda.
41 min
21
Roe v. Wade | 2. Life or Death
How a doctor and nurse from Cincinnati irrevocably changed the debate over abortion in America.
50 min
22
Roe v. Wade | 1+. The 1960s TV Drama That Dared...
And inspired a plotline in "Mad Men" decades later.
40 min
23
Roe v. Wade | 1. Get Married or Go Home
In 1971, Shirley Wheeler became the public face of the fight for abortion rights.
51 min
24
Season 7 Trailer - Roe v. Wade
The women who fought for legal abortion, the activists who pushed back, and the justices who thought they could solve the issue for good.
2 min
25
The L.A. Riots | 8+. “Rebuilding” L.A.
More on the aftermath of the riots, plus reflections on the making of Season 6.
54 min