This is Mission
This is Mission  
Podcast: Grounded with Jon Tester & Maritsa Georgiou
Published On: Tue May 26 2026
Description: We got an early start Tuesday dissecting all things legal with former federal prosecutor and national treasure Glenn Kirschner, who holds online community chats every night to discuss the pressing legal developments of the day. “When you’re fighting for democracy, it’s not really a job. This is mission. You know, I got a lot of kids and grandkids and what are we going to leave them?” Kirschner said. “I just try to figure out like what is the most important legal development for people to understand? And that’s what I try to tackle.” And there are so many to choose from. We hit on the $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund,” the great seashell caper, and the U.S. military’s boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific. “When we suspect somebody is in international waters with drugs on the boat heading toward the United States, that’s why we have a Coast Guard,” Kirschner said. “We interdict them. We seize the evidence. We bring them into a court of law in the United States and we try to hold them accountable for any crimes they may have committed. We don’t murder them.” We also discuss the war in Iran (which is deeply personal to Kirschner's family), the untapped power of contempt in the courts, and the accountability mission Kirschner calls a non-negotiable.