Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Rachel Maddow

Now available: Rachel Maddow Presents Ultra, Season 2

Rachel Maddow outlines the second season of her award-winning podcast "Ultra," which tells an all-but-forgotten true story of an ascendant American demagogue and the frayed line between violent extremism and mainstream politics. There’s an international manhunt for an American traitor, a spy inside the U.S. Army’s Nazi war crimes prosecutions, and a bizarre (and successful!) foreign influence operation inside Congress. Listen to the trailer and follow now for free, or subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts for early access and ad-free listening.

Bonus episode

Subscriber exclusive

Bonus Episode: Combating Antisemitism Today

Rachel Maddow discusses season two of her award-winning podcast with U.S. Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt, President Biden’s Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism. They delve into the roots of antisemitism and Holocaust denial, and the U.S. government's ongoing global efforts to combat antisemitism. Now available to MSNBC Premium subscribers on Apple Podcasts.

US Special Envoy For Antisemitism Deborah Lipstadt Interview

Victor J. Blue / Bloomberg via Getty Images

Transcript

Transcript: Combating antisemitism today

U.S. Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt discusses the roots of antisemitism and Holocaust denial

Season Two, Episode One

Associated Press

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 1: Dr. Hunt

A popular senator takes his own life, shocking the nation

Wyoming State Archives

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode One

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode One of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

Rachel Maddow

Library

Rachel Maddow's bookshelf: Ultra, season 2

A visual bibliography of the important books that contributed to Rachel Maddow's research for season two of the Ultra podcast

Season Two, Episode Two

Harold Keith Thompson Collection, Hoover Institution Library & Archives, Stanford University

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 2: The Mole

The search for Francis Yockey

Associated Press

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Two

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Two of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

Season Two, Episode Three

An American survivor of the Malmedy Massacre testifies in a war crimes trial in Dachau, Germany, May 20, 1946.

NARA, via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 3: Malmedy

A gruesome hoax around the shocking massacre of American troops

NARA

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Three

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Three of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

NARA

Video archive

WATCH: U.S. Army prosecutor makes the case against the Malmedy Massacre defendants, 1946

Source: NARA, via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Video archive

WATCH: American survivor of the Malmedy Massacre testifies in war crimes trial, 1946

Source: NARA, via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Linkout tease image for supplemental material S2E3 Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Video archive

WATCH: Decades later, American WWII veteran recalls surviving the Malmedy Massacre

Source: NARA, via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Bonus episode

MSNBC

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Bonus Episode: Rachel Maddow in Conversation with Tony Kushner

Recorded live at Provincetown Town Hall

Rachel Maddow and Tony Kushner, December 2, 2012

Flashback!

December 2, 2012: Rachel Maddow talks with Tony Kushner at the Public Theater in New York City

Season Two, Episode Four

Senator Joseph McCarthy, September 28, 1947

Joe Rosenthal/San Francisco Chronicle / Hearst Newspapers via Getty Images

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 4: Spectacle

The American ultra right takes up a strange new cause after the war... sympathy for Nazi war criminals.

Getty Images/Bettmann Archive

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Four

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Four of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

Document

READ: Senate Report on Malmedy Massacre Investigation

Season Two, Episode Five

NYC Department of Records

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 5: Coming home

One step ahead of investigators with the help of the pro-Nazi American ultra right

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Five

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Five of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

Rachel Maddow

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Rachel Maddow's bookshelf: Ultra, season 2

A visual bibliography of the important books that contributed to Rachel Maddow's research for season two of the Ultra podcast

Season Two, Episode Six

Photo provided by Lucy Simpson and posted on findagrave.com

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 6: Under pressure

Political pushback leads to blackmail

Buddy Hunt

Slideshow

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Six

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Six of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

Video extra

WATCH: Buddy Hunt’s interview with journalist Michael Isikoff

Buddy Hunt talks with Michael Isikoff in the Yahoo News documentary "Uniquely Nasty: The U.S. Government's War on Gays."

Season Two, Episode Seven

Bettmann / Bettmann Archive

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 7: Mobilized

Mainstream Republicans and radicals on the ultra right find common cause

Associated Press

Slide show

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Seven

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Seven of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.

Season Two, Episode Eight

Newspaper photograph of a handcuffed Francis Yockey being led into court, June 1960

San Francisco Examiner

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Season 2, Episode 8: Mystery Man

A strange and dramatic end

Associated Press

Slide Show

From the Archives: Season Two, Episode Eight

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Eight of Season Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, released early for subscribers to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts

Document

'Threatened and Blackmailed'

Letter sent by Lester C. "Buddy" Hunt, Jr. to the Department of Justice in 2015 asking that a "formal review" be done of the Sen. Joseph McCarthy-led blackmail efforts that led to his father's 1954 suicide

Rachel Maddow

Library

Rachel Maddow's bookshelf: Ultra, season 2

A visual bibliography of the important books that contributed to Rachel Maddow's research for season two of the Ultra podcast

Early access

Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts

The hit podcast “Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra” is back for a second season. The first episode is available Monday for free, but you can subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts to get it early and ad-free today

Press

The Last Word

'Got to stand up against a monster like this': Maddow unearths forgotten democracy threat

Reliable Sources

Maddow on the Media

Rachel Maddow talks with Oliver Darcy about the new season of "Ultra," the 2024 campaign, and whether she fears she might be a target of Donald Trump's wrath should be win a second term.

Variety

Variety: Second season of Ultra premiers Monday June 10th

Listen Now

Introducing Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Sitting members of Congress aiding and abetting a plot to overthrow the government. Insurrectionists criminally charged with plotting to end American democracy for good. Justice Department prosecutors under crushing political pressure. Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra is the all-but-forgotten true story of good, old-fashioned American extremism getting supercharged by proximity to power. When extremist elected officials get caught plotting against America with the violent ultra right, this is the story of the lengths they will go to… to cover their tracks.

Episode One

The scattered wreckage of the Pennsylvania Central Airlines plane which crashed during a violent thunderstorm near Lovettsville on Aug. 31st, killing 25 persons, including Senator Ernest Lundeen of Minn.

ACME / Edward W. Spannaus, Lovettsville Historical Society

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 1: Trip 19

The death of U.S. Senator Ernest Lundeen in a mysterious plane crash in 1940 left a series of questions that lead to revealing threats to American democracy.

Via the Library of Congress, photograph by Harris & Ewing

Deeper dive

From the Archives: Episode 1

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode One of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Ernest Lundeen papers, Hoover Institution Library & Archives

Full document

The speech written for Sen. Ernest Lundeen by a paid Nazi agent.

Lundeen was carrying these pages when he died, and they were found near the scene of the plane crash.

Episode Two

Bettmann Archive

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 2: The Brooklyn Boys

Father Charles E. Coughlin calls for armed Americans to create a militia. Their plot to overthrow the U.S. government and democracy questions if the country can handle that kind of homegrown threat.

Getty Images

Deeper Dive

From the Archives: Episode 2

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Two of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode Three

Hulton Deutsch / Corbis via Getty Images file

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 3: The Day

A private spy ring in Los Angeles works to do what law enforcement fails to: infiltrate far-right groups plotting violence across the country and foil their plans.

Getty Images

Deeper dive

From the Archives: Episode 3

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Three of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

video archive

WATCH: German Day festivities in Hindenburg Park, Los Angeles

Source: Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford University

Video archive

WATCH: Silver Legion member distributes propaganda outside the Aryan Bookstore in Los Angeles

Episode Four

A crowd of over 4,000 people filled the Gospel Tabernacle in Fort Wayne, Ind., to hear Col. Charles Lindbergh, seen on the speaker's stand in the center, address a rally of the America First Committee on Oct. 3, 194.

AP file

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 4: A Bad Angle

Members of United States Congress, the America First movement and a paid agent of Hitler's government work to weaken democracy and spread Nazi propaganda.

George Sylvester Viereck Papers, The University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City, Iowa

Deeper dive

From the Archives: Episode 4

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Four of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

George Sylvester Viereck Papers, The University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City, Iowa

Correspondence

READ: Letters between Sen. Ernest Lundeen and Nazi agent George Sylvester Viereck

Source: Ernest Lundeen papers, Hoover Institution Library & Archives

Episode Five

Sen. Burton K. Wheeler, Charles Lindbergh, and Kathleen Norris pledge allegiance to the American flag at an America First Committee rally

Irving Haberman / IH Images/Getty Images file

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 5: Shut It Down

Members of Congress and the America First movement working to spread Nazi propaganda try to shut down reporting and a Justice Department investigation into their activities.

Bettmann Archive via Getty Images

Deeper dive

From the Archives: Episode 5

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Five of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode Six

Signature of special prosecutor O. John Rogge on a document related to the Mass Sedition Trial of 1944.

Kelsey Desiderio / MSNBC

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 6: Bedlam

Justice Department prosecutor O. John Rogge isn't prepared for the pre-planned chaos that erupts as the most high-profile sedition trial in U.S. history begins.

AP Photo/Eugene Abbott

Deeper dive

From the Archives: Episode 6

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Six of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Original document

READ: O. John Rogge's charges against 30 Americans for trying to overthrow the government in 1944

Source: United States v. McWilliams, Cr. No. 73086/The National Archives

Original document

READ: Questions for potential jurors from defense attorneys in 1944 sedition trial

Source: United States v. McWilliams, Cr. No. 73086/The National Archives

Episode Seven

Supporters of North Dakota Governor William Langer demonstrate in Bismarck, N.D.

State Historical Society of North Dakota

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 7: Rinse, Repeat

State Historical Society of North Dakota

Deeper dive

From the Archives: Episode 7

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Seven of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode Eight

William Power Maloney; Dillard Stokes; Henry Hoke; Frances Sweeney; O. John Rogge; Drew Pearson

Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

Episode 8: Ultra Vires

AP Photo

Deeper Dive

From the Archives: Episode Eight

Archival materials to further illustrate Episode Eight of Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra

U.S. Department of Justice

bonus audio

LISTEN: DOJ prosecutor O. John Rogge's full Meet the Press interview

NBC News, via the Library of Congress, Dec. 6, 1946

Author interview

Rachel Maddow

Lessons from a World War II scandal that put the Justice Department to the test

Rachel Maddow talks to historian Bradley Hart about protecting democracy and the lessons learned from a WWII scandal in which some members of Congress worked with a Nazi agent to distribute pro-Nazi propaganda.

Talking about it

Yonit Levi / Unholy: Two Jews on the News

Podcast

Rachel Maddow talks with Yonit Levi and Jonathan Freedland of Unholy: Two Jews on the News (Spotify version)

Podcast

Terry Gross interviews Rachel Maddow about Ultra for NPR's Fresh Air

Maddow's podcast uncovers the widespread anti-Semitic, pro-German sympathies active among major religious and political leaders in the U.S. in the lead-up to U.S. entering WWII.

Podcast audio

An exclusive WITHpod conversation with Rachel Maddow

podcast audio

Rachel Maddow on America’s Forgotten Insurrection | Crooked Media

Podcast audio

Ezra Klein Show: Rachel Maddow looks back on a wild 14 years

Video Clips

The Last Word

Rachel Maddow on how she stumbled on forgotten history of 'Ultra'

MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell is joined by Rachel Maddow to discuss "Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra," and to explain how she discovered the largely forgotten threat to American democracy revealed in the podcast.

The Reidout

Maddow on her hit podcast 'Ultra': We need a permanent anti-fascist consciousness as a country

Rachel Maddow discusses her chart-topping podcast series, "Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra." She joins Joy Reid on her podcast that tells a story of the time not too long ago in our country's history when a Nazi agent named George Sylvester Viereck attempted to infiltrate Congress.

All In

Maddow: Oath Keepers convictions make it harder to whitewash Jan. 6

Rachel Maddow: “Having a seditious conspiracy conviction in the Oath Keepers case—these convictions tell you in history what this was. And yeah they’ll try to contest it, but it’s going to make it much harder for them to define this as something normal or laudable.”

The Last Word

'I've gone too far to turn back': Maddow reveals threat to U.S. 'lost to history'

MSNBC's Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O'Donnell discuss Maddow's new podcast, "Ultra," shedding new light on an existential threat to America and American democracy long forgotten by history.

Alex Wagner Tonight

'Don't let people yank your chain': Rachel Maddow on deflating political 'rabble-rousers'

Rachel Maddow

New Maddow podcast finds contemporary resonance in 1940s sedition trial

Rachel Maddow announces that her new podcast series, Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra, will publish its first two episodes on Monday, October 10th, and explains that the podcast's plot revolves around a sedition trial not unlike the Oath Keepers sedition trial that began today.