The Capitol Forum

Power in Washington isn't announced — it's revealed. The Capitol Forum brings you inside the policy discussions and corporate investigations that move markets and shape American life. Listen to Second Request with Teddy Downey for sharp, unfiltered analysis of antitrust policy in America. Then stay for TCF Investigates with Arjun Singh, a narrative documentary series bringing listeners inside the reporting, sources, and regulatory developments shaping markets and corporate strategy.

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34 episodes
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Avg 59 min
English

Episodes 34

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Friday · 1 hr
John Deere’s Crumbs for Farmers (Second Request)
John Deere has agreed to pay $99 million to settle a class action over farmers’ right to repair their own equipment. But after lawyers and administrators take their cut, farmers could be left with a small slice of the pie. In this episode of Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Willie Cade, CEO of Graceful Solutions, to break down the settlement, dealer consolidation, and who should own farm equipment data.
Thursday · 31 min
Who’s to Blame for High Gas Prices? (TCF Investigates)
Americans are furious about President Donald Trump’s role in driving up gas prices. With the midterm elections just weeks away, even Republican voters are souring on Trump over the cost of everything. In the first episode of our election series, TCF Investigates host Arjun Singh and senior correspondent Paul McLeod sit down with Capitol Forum reporter Max Berengaut to learn how refinery consolidation is pushing fuel costs even higher. Then they talk with pollster G. Elliott Morris to understand what’s driving voters.
Tuesday · 1 hr 29 min
Bad Grades (Private Credit Crisis)
The ratings agencies already failed investors in 2008. Are they about to do it again? Today on Private Credit Crisis, Executive Editor Teddy Downey talks with Rod Dubitsky, who rated subprime bonds at Moody's before the financial crisis. They discuss whether the high ratings on private equity-owned life insurers can be trusted, and what investors and regulators might be missing.
October 2 · 1 hr 3 min
Can Anything Save the House GOP? (Second Request)
With a month until the midterms, the polls have Democrats favored to take the House and voters angry about high prices, especially at the pump. In this episode of Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey, senior podcast producer Arjun Singh and reporter Paul McLeod sit down with G. Elliott Morris, a data journalist and pollster who writes the Substack Strength in Numbers. They dig into where the House and Senate races stand, how gas prices and the war in Iran are dragging down President Trump, and how to tell good polling from noise. Read Elliott's Substack here: https://www.gelliottmorris.com/
September 29 · 1 hr 10 min
The Fox Guarding the Hen House (Private Credit Crisis)
Private equity owned life insurers are supposed to prepare for the worst, but some of them aren't preparing for anything close to it. Today on Private Credit Crisis, Executive Editor Teddy Downey talks with Corwin Zass, a consulting actuary who has spent more than 25 years advising life insurers on capital and risk.
September 25 · 1 hr 6 min
Antitrust in Trump 2.0 (Second Request)
From Ticketmaster to Paramount-Warner Bros., the Trump administration has had a full docket of antitrust-related cases to deal with. In this episode of Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Karina Lubell, partner in Brunswick Group's global antitrust and competition practice, and Nicholas Cheolas, partner at Wiley, to discuss the evolving antitrust enforcement landscape under the second Trump administration.
September 22 · 54 min
Clouding Accounting (Private Credit Crisis)
Two life insurers can own the exact same bond and tell their regulators two different stories about how risky it is. In this episode of Private Credit Crisis, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Florida State University professor Kyeonghee Kim to discuss what changes at a life insurer after private equity buys it, and whether the system meant to catch bad numbers is actually built to.
September 18 · 1 hr 5 min
The Anonymous Data Problem DOGE Created (Second Request)
Everyone knows their data gets sold. Almost nobody knows how much of it companies just give away, blurred enough to call it anonymous. In this episode of Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with former Capitol Forum correspondent and privacy lawyer Ben Neumeyer to discuss how DOGE spent a year and a half pooling federal records and made every one of those files findable again.
September 15 · 1 hr 8 min
Hiding Money in Bermuda (Private Credit Crisis)
There's a hole in the life and annuity sector's balance sheet, and private equity dug it. In this episode of Private Credit Crisis, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Nick Nemeth, an investor and the writer of Mispriced Assets, to discuss the life and annuity industry's growing exposure to private credit and the potential risks for insurers and the broader financial system.
September 11 · 1 hr 5 min
The Perils of Personalized Pricing (Second Request)
With little response from the federal government, state legislatures around the country are looking at banning the use of personalized pricing. Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Hal Singer and Gavin Sicard to explain what personalized pricing actually is, and how its deployment today leads to higher consumer prices.
September 8 · 59 min
Lies, Loans and Lawsuits (Private Credit Crisis)
We're excited to introduce Private Credit Crisis, a new weekly podcast from The Capitol Forum examining the policy problems building inside the private credit industry. In this first episode, Executive Editor Teddy Downey and reporter Josh Kosman sit down with attorney Jim Woolery, who is bringing lawsuits on behalf of investors alleging that private equity firms have inflated the assets on their balance sheets and charged inflated management fees on those assets, even as their performance has deteriorated.
September 4 · 56 min
Streaming Is the New IP Battleground (Second Request)
When phone makers turned on Qualcomm, the company built an intricate, multi-front strategy to fight back. Now, two former employees say the same playbook is being run in streaming. Today on Second Request, Christie Thoene and Kirti Gupta sit down with executive editor Teddy Downey to revisit their years inside Qualcomm and explain how today's fights over streaming technology mirror the smartphone wars of the 2010s.
August 28 · 59 min
Meta's House of Cards (Second Request)
This week, Meta reached a multibillion-dollar settlement in federal court over allegations that it was aware of the harm its products could cause to teenage mental health. That may be the tip of the iceberg for Mark Zuckerberg's problems. Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Julia Angwin to discuss how Meta's core business, Facebook, is failing, and how Zuckerberg's ambitions to become an AI giant have failed to materialize.
August 21 · 57 min
AI Needs to Nearly Triple Productivity to Pay Off (Second Request)
To earn the return on its investment, artificial intelligence will need to nearly triple productivity in the U.S. economy. So what will it do? Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Jessica Wachter, the Dr. Bruce I. Jacobs Professor of Quantitative Finance at the Wharton School and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, to discuss her recent paper, "What Investment Data Implies About the AI Transition," co-authored with Jonathan Wachter.
August 14 · 34 min
Paramount's Long Odyssey to Own Warner Bros. (TCF Investigates)
The Ellison family has been on a quest to reshape American media and Hollywood — their next target: Warner Bros. Discovery, home of HBO Max and CNN. Today on TCF Investigates, Arjun Singh sits down with editors Jeff Bliss and Jim Oliphant to hear about The Capitol Forum's exclusive reporting on the states' merger trial, and why a state victory could be a paradigm shift for antitrust law.
August 14 · 1 hr 1 min
Alternative Protein vs Big Meat (Second Request)
Plant-based protein has become a mainstay in restaurants and household dinners, but as an emerging industry it's susceptible to the market power of major food companies. Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Andy Fitch and Cynthia Hanawalt of Columbia Law School's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law to discuss how antitrust law could prevent the alternative protein industry from being eaten up by its biggest players.
August 7 · 1 hr 8 min
How Private Equity Could Create a New Financial Crisis (Second Request)
Millions of life insurance policies are tied to the fortunes and speculation of the world's biggest private equity companies. Now, their risk of defaulting on their obligations is increasing, and some worry it could lead to another financial crisis. Today on Second Request, Teddy Downey sits down with Andrew Granato, Assistant Professor at the University of Texas School of Law, and Pranjal Drall, a J.D.-Ph.D. candidate in Financial Economics at Yale University, to discuss their recent paper, "Private Credit's State Backstop: How Private Equity Socializes Risk Through Insurers."
July 31 · 59 min
The Emerging Antitrust Risks in Edge Computing (Second Request)
Waymo, Apple, Meta and Google have constructed ecosystems that have immense leverage over the global economy and infrastructure. So how should antitrust law tackle that? Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with J. Wyatt Fore to discuss the emerging antitrust risks in edge computing and AI.
July 24 · 59 min
Inside Uber's AI Strategy to Inflate Your Fare (Second Request)
Same ride, two different prices — that's the new reality facing Uber and Lyft passengers. Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Derek Kravitz of Consumer Reports to talk about Kravitz's new reporting on how Uber and Lyft make use of algorithmic pricing to charge consumers different prices and inflate base costs.
July 22 · 1 hr 2 min
How Credit Card Swipe Fees Became Multibillion Dollar Tolls (Second Request)
Today on Second Request, Executive Editor Teddy Downey sits down with Carter Dougherty, senior fellow for anti-monopoly and finance at Demand Progress, who argues that Visa and Mastercard enable banks to coordinate pricing without ever explicitly agreeing to it — and makes the case for how the Credit Card Competition Act, ongoing antitrust litigation, and a more aggressive enforcement posture could finally break the duopoly's grip on the payments market.

Showing 1–20 of 34 episodes