Pramila Jayapal on Going From Banker to Organizer, and Eric Foner on the Right to Vote

Pramila Jayapal on Going From Banker to Organizer, and Eric Foner on the Right to Vote

On this week’s episode of the Start Making Sense podcast, the representative and the historian join us to discuss politics and history.

Jon Wiener and Start Making Sense
Copy Link
Facebook
X (Twitter)
Bluesky
Pocket
Email

Pramila Jayapal is head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and represents Seattle in the House. She will explain how, as a young immigrant from India, she went from being an investment banker to a lifelong organizer. Her book Use the Power You Have: A Brown Woman’s Guide to Politics and Political Change is out now.

Also on this week’s show, historian Eric Foner talks about about voting rights, voter suppression, who gets to be a citizen, the rights of undocumented immigrants, and about the roots of mass incarceration. They all relate to the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments: part of the country’s attempt to redefine citizenship after the end of slavery. His book The Second Founding: How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution is out now in paperback.

Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.

Time is running out to have your gift matched 

In this time of unrelenting, often unprecedented cruelty and lawlessness, I’m grateful for Nation readers like you. 

So many of you have taken to the streets, organized in your neighborhood and with your union, and showed up at the ballot box to vote for progressive candidates. You’re proving that it is possible—to paraphrase the legendary Patti Smith—to redeem the work of the fools running our government.

And as we head into 2026, I promise that The Nation will fight like never before for justice, humanity, and dignity in these United States. 

At a time when most news organizations are either cutting budgets or cozying up to Trump by bringing in right-wing propagandists, The Nation’s writers, editors, copy editors, fact-checkers, and illustrators confront head-on the administration’s deadly abuses of power, blatant corruption, and deconstruction of both government and civil society. 

We couldn’t do this crucial work without you.

Through the end of the year, a generous donor is matching all donations to The Nation’s independent journalism up to $75,000. But the end of the year is now only days away. 

Time is running out to have your gift doubled. Don’t wait—donate now to ensure that our newsroom has the full $150,000 to start the new year. 

Another world really is possible. Together, we can and will win it!

Love and Solidarity,

John Nichols 

Executive Editor, The Nation

Jon Wiener Jon Wiener is a contributing editor of The Nation and co-author (with Mike Davis) of Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties.


Start Making Sense Start Making Sense is The Nation’s podcast, hosted by Jon Wiener and coproduced by the Los Angeles Review of Books. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts for new episodes each Thursday.  


x