Make It Make Sense with Grant Hermes
Politics has never been more chaotic, and most podcasts just add to the noise. Make It Make Sense with Grant Hermes cuts through it. Grant is an AP Award-winning journalist with over a decade of on-the-ground reporting on the biggest political stories, scandals, and elections in America. Twice a week, he takes the stories dominating the headlines and breaks them down in plain English — no jargon, no spin, no shouting. If you care about what’s happening in this country but you’re exhausted by how it’s being covered, this is the show for you. Real reporting. Clear explanations. Actual context. Make It Make Sense drops three times a week. Subscribe so you never miss it.
Episodes
Over the weekend, on Trump's birthday, the US and Iran announced they'd reached a deal to end the war. The actual text has not been released. What we know so far is that this is a memorandum of understanding, not a signed treaty, and by no measure does any foreign policy expert consider that a real deal yet.
The Strait of Hormuz, which 20% of the world's oil flows through, did not reopen immediately as promised. As of record...
Barb McQuade spent her career as a US Attorney prosecuting organized crime, including the conviction of former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick on extortion, bribery, and fraud charges. Trump later pardoned Kilpatrick. In her new book, The Fix, she argues the Trump administration is running the exact same playbook she spent her career prosecuting. Her words: "it's just crime."
Grant and Barb walk through the parallels in detai...
103 days into a war Donald Trump promised would never happen, the United States is striking targets inside Iran and along the Iranian coast for the third straight day. The Secretary of Defense announced the US would target bridges and power plants. Legal scholars say those strikes are unconstitutional. International law experts say targeting civilian infrastructure is a war crime.
This morning, Trump announced the US would b...
California held its primary last week. Six days later, votes were still being counted. That's normal. But Trump, Elon Musk, and Mike Johnson decided it was evidence of massive fraud, with zero evidence, which they have admitted publicly. Grant breaks down exactly why California's count takes as long as it does, why a Republican surge followed by a Democratic catch-up is just math and not a conspiracy, and why you should treat every...
Zach Everson is the research director at Public Citizen and the head of their Trump Accountability Project. He is a former Forbes reporter who has spent a decade tracking how Donald Trump uses the presidency to make money. This term, he says, the scale is incomparable to the first.
Forbes estimates Trump has made roughly $1.9 billion from crypto since being reelected. That includes the meme coin, the USD1 stable coin backed ...
Trump went seven full days without a public appearance. When he resurfaced, it was first in a pre-taped podcast interview with a friendly outlet where he didn't look well, and then in an unscheduled Oval Office press conference where he struggled to follow questions, compared a flat reflecting pool to skyscrapers, and told Kaitlin Collins to smile more.
That press conference also produced the clearest sign yet that the Iran ...
Two federal judges have now stepped in to freeze Trump's $1.8 billion anti-weaponization slush fund. One judge in Virginia halted all payouts. A judge in Miami reopened the entire IRS lawsuit after 35 former federal judges called the settlement a fraud on the court. The DOJ quietly backed down Monday and said it would comply.
That means the Trump loyalists who were promised a payout for their loyalty are not getting one, at ...
Steve Cash from The Steady State is back on the show this week. He spent his career as a prosecutor, CIA counterterrorism officer, and DHS intelligence official. He also lived and worked in countries run by authoritarian leaders. What he's watching happen in the United States right now looks familiar.
In this conversation, Grant and Steve break down how "national security" has become the Trump administration's all-purpose ju...
It's a grab bag episode, because everything is happening at once.
Iran launched missiles at Kuwait AND drones near the Strait of Hormuz while reportedly agreeing to a 60-day ceasefire extension. Troops are massing in the Caribbean ready to invade Cuba. Trump's DOJ is investigating E. Jean Carroll, the woman he was found to have sexually assaulted in civil court and owes $91.6 million. DHS is reportedly planning to shut down ...
Trump spent the weekend claiming an Iran deal was basically done, just some last-minute details to iron out. Except that those "details" were Iran's entire nuclear program and the Strait of Hormuz. Then Qatar had to take over the negotiations. Then the deal wasn't a deal. Then bombs started falling again.
Grant breaks down the full Iran saga, the not-deal-deal, the Abraham Accords demand that stunned Middle Eastern leaders i...
The Department of Justice has lost over 10,000 employees. The acting Attorney General, Todd Blanche, appears to be auditioning for the permanent job by doing whatever the President wants. The FBI Director, Kash Patel, has faced serious misconduct allegations, and nothing has been done about it. So what does it actually mean for the rest of us?
Grant sits down with Stacey Young, founder of Justice Connection, an organization supporti...
The Democratic Party just released its long-awaited autopsy of the 2024 Harris campaign, and it's not what voters were promised.
The 192-page report has no executive summary, no conclusion, no sourcing, and is riddled with basic factual errors. The DNC itself won't endorse it. So what does it actually say, and why was it released at all?
Today, Grant breaks down what's in the report, what's glaringly missing (hint: Ga...
The ceasefire in the Iran War officially expires TODAY and the White House is searching for a loophole to restart military strikes without Congressional approval.
Meanwhile, Trump's DOJ just created a $1.776 billion fund that shields the Trump family from IRS audits, forever, and could pay out taxpayer money to January 6th participants. Grant breaks it all down.
CHAPTERS:
00:00 – Intro: Two Loopholes, One Episo...
36 doctors, psychiatrists, and Nobel laureates just signed an open letter, now part of the official Congressional Record, saying Donald Trump's mental and physical decline makes him too dangerous to hold the nuclear codes.
Grant sits down with Dr. Henry Abraham, one of the letter's lead authors and a former Harvard Medical School psychiatrist, to break down exactly what they're seeing, why they're speaking out now, and what it...
Inflation just hit 3.8%, the highest in three years, and wages can't keep up. Gas is nearly $4.50 a gallon, groceries cost more than ever, and the war in Iran is in its 11th week with no end in sight.
Today, Grant breaks down what the numbers actually mean for your wallet, why last week's "good" jobs report is more complicated than the headline, and what Trump is trying to do about it before summer.
CHAPTERS
1:45 — Gas...
Why is the Democratic Party so lost right now, and is there actually a path forward?
Former presidential campaign manager and Democratic strategist Maya Rupert joins Grant Hermes to break down the real state of the Democratic Party six months out from the 2026 midterms. We get into the DNC's 208-page playbook that says almost nothing about voters, why Chuck Schumer's days as leader are numbered, the devastating Louisiana v. Ca...
The White House is claiming a peace deal with Iran is close, but
The deal on the table looks almost identical to the Obama-era agreement
Trump tore up in 2018. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio
openly told the press that the administration doesn't feel bound by the
War Powers Act, and one Republican congressman from Michigan is
trying to force the issue with a new bill.
We break down what's actual...
The president told Congress the Iran war was "terminated." The Secretary of Defense says there's still a ceasefire. Then Trump called it a "mini-war" on camera. So... which is it?
Today, Grant breaks down the War Powers Act deadline that forced Trump's hand, the new "Project Freedom" operation in the Strait of Hormuz, why gas just hit $4.50/gallon nationally, and what the polls say about where Americans actually stand.
It's like Looksmaxxing but for gerrymandering. GERRYMAXXING
The Supreme Court just finished what John Roberts started 45 years ago, gutting the Voting Rights Act. And the political earthquake it's about to cause will be felt in every state, in every race, all the way down to your school board.
In this episode, Grant sits down with Dave Daley, author and senior fellow at FairVote, to break down the Supreme Court's ruling in Loui...
The Supreme Court just gutted the Voting Rights Act. Grant explains what that means for your vote, your district, and the next election. Plus: four massive government deadlines expire TONIGHT, Congress goes on recess, and we learn the truth about six Americans killed at a base in Kuwait with zero protection.
Today's episode breaks down:
- The Supreme Court's ruling in Louisiana v. Callais and why it sets American elections back 45&...
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