SEASON TWO: THE KINGMAKERS IS HERE
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Master Plan, the award-winning investigative podcast series from The Lever, reveals the hidden forces behind today’s biggest problems — and how small groups of powerful people engineered those problems to serve their own interests. We are exposing their schemes.
Narrated by David Sirota, an award-winning investigative journalist and Oscar nominee for his work on the film Don’t Look Up.
Master Plan has received the 2025 National Press Club Award for Audio Journalism, the New York Festivals Radio Award for Best Investigative Journalism Podcast, multiple Signal Awards for Best News & Politics Podcast and Best Writing. It was an Ambies finalist for Best Politics podcast and was named a Webby Awards Honoree.
Learn more at masterplanpodcast.com
Latest episodes
Showing 20 · updated from the feed
Episode 8: The Inheritance | The Kingmakers
In the season finale of Master Plan: The Kingmakers, we ask Democratic leaders what the next U.S. president should do with the expanded executive powers that Trump will l
Sep 14 57 min
Episode 7: The King’s Man | The Kingmakers
A little-known conservative operative spends years figuring out how to bend the machinery of government to a president's will. By the time Donald Trump returns for his se
Aug 25 1 h 03 min
Episode 6: Obama’s Kill List | The Kingmakers
Obama vowed to restore the rule of law after the War on Terror. But behind closed doors, his administration created a secret system that allowed the president to decide w
Aug 18 1 h 15 min
Episode 5: State of Emergency | The Kingmakers
September 11, 2001 brought chaos and terror to the United States. It also brought an unprecedented opportunity.
After decades of watching what he felt was the erosion of
Aug 11 1 h 04 min
The Return of the Kingmakers
Every crisis creates an opportunity. The final chapters of The Kingmakers reveal the plot to build an all-powerful presidency — and put it in the hands of a man who wants
Jul 28 2 min
BONUS: The Untouched Power That Could Stop Trump's Iran War
As Trump’s war in Iran approached a critical 60-day deadline, we took a deep dive into the War Powers Resolution, the Nixon-era law designed to limit presidential war-mak
Apr 30 52 min
Episode 4: The Meese Doctrine | The Kingmakers
Rather than retreat from Iran-Contra and other scandals, conservative operatives inside the White House — led by Attorney General Edwin Meese — went on the offensive. Dra
Apr 28 51 min
Episode 3: President Rambo | The Kingmakers
Emboldened by a landslide election, the president’s men began to see themselves as 1980s action-movie heroes, willing to break the law to get what they want. The result w
Apr 14 40 min
Episode 2: Mandate for Power | The Kingmakers
How did Project 2025 take control of the White House? It all began decades ago, when a beer-baron-backed think tank handed President Ronald Reagan an 1,100-page instructi
Mar 30 51 min
Episode 1: After The Fall | The Kingmakers
Before Trump, there was Nixon. His attempts to seize the power of the purse and secretly expand the Vietnam War forged a constitutional crisis, a backlash, and a template
Mar 16 43 min
Season 2 Trailer: The Kingmakers
A new season of Master Plan debuts on March 16.
For early access to new episodes and exclusive bonus content, click here to upgrade to a paid subscription to The Lever.
Mar 2 5 min
The Master Plan Book Is Here
We’ve got big news — Master Plan is now a book!
Master Plan: The Hidden Plot to Legalize Corruption in America, co-authored by David Sirota and Jared Jacang Maher, is no
Oct 17 2025 7 min
S1 BONUS: The Master Planners’ Election (With Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse)
In a special Master Plan bonus episode, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse joins David Sirota to break down the impact of the Supreme Court’s’ 2010 Citizens United ruling on 2024
Nov 4 2024 55 min
S1 E11: Hell Or High Water | Legalizing Corruption
We all live in the master planners’ world now, immersed in an ocean of corruption. The 2024 Republican presidential campaign is bankrolled by billionaires, while corporat
Oct 29 2024 1 h 08 min
S1 E10: The Heist | Legalizing Corruption
Unleashed by the Citizens United ruling, the master planners launch a three-part heist to crack the vault protecting democracy itself. First, the schemers take out the se
Oct 22 2024 1 h 08 min
S1 E9: Going Big | Legalizing Corruption
An anti-abortion legal activist starts using the federal courts to chip away at campaign finance restrictions, setting his sights on the Supreme Court. Indiana lawyer Jam
Oct 15 2024 1 h 04 min
S1 E8: Shock and Awe | Legalizing Corruption
As President George W. Bush declares “Mission Accomplished” in the Iraq War, his administration wages a different war with swing-state senators defying his judicial nomin
Oct 8 2024 53 min
S1 E7: Rise of the Machine | Legalizing Corruption
After a series of setbacks in the push to legalize corruption, the master planners know they must take over the U.S. Supreme Court and halt the trend of Republican-appoin
Oct 1 2024 58 min
S1 E6: The Maverick | Legalizing Corruption
When five U.S. senators get caught pressuring a regulator on behalf of a financial magnate, they become known as the “Keating Five.” The public is predictably outraged. B
Sep 24 2024 1 h 02 min
S1 E5: Corporations Are People | Legalizing Corruption
You might remember Mitt Romney’s infamous line: “Corporations are people, my friend.” But where did this idea come from? In this episode: how the Ford Administration and
Sep 17 2024 53 min
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#8
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Chart positions
Where Master Plan ranks today in each Apple Podcasts chart (US, Sep 20, 2026).
A curated, balanced selection of Apple Podcasts reviews.
An incredibly informative, sweeping overview filled out with some of the whackest details / asides imaginable. Seems an indispensable audio document for listeners interested in restoring democracy to the United States… much props to all involved in its production!
AC/EC · Dec 2024
Excellent content, but I would really, really have appreciated more dates being added for key moments. This would have anchored the content and allowed it to flow more coherently. As it is, I constantly hear the mental static of, “now when was this exactly?”
Thank you for the podcast!
southern liberal · Nov 2024
Sirota returns to his roots as an investigative reporter and uncovers kind of what we all know - the plot to legalize corruption, half a century in the making. It’s a fascinating lesson, a ton of major linchpins in their plan, and you learn the calculus the Master Planners take, the opportunities they seize. My favorite episode is #6 on John McCain, whose politics I hate, but I always respected his imprisonment in Vietnam. I learned the major risks he took fighting Rs and Ds in Congress. The balls on him.
It’s the most important story in a generation, probably more. Fingers crossed this reporting will bring down some of the titans of corruption. The Lever’s newsroom is one of the handful of actual reporters left. The only other one I follow is Democracy Now.
Matt is my name · Oct 2024
There are many voice recordings from interviews and the like and they are always at a significantly lower volume than the hosts commentary. When I listen I am constantly turning the volume up when a voice recording is played, only to have to turn it back down again when the host starts talking. Its a very good show with great subject matter and content but the volume changing is gonna drive me loco.
Ron radden · Oct 2024
We strive to present a balanced view by showing a diverse range of reviews from Apple Podcasts.
Here you find the Apple Podcasts chart positions of Master Plan, its latest episodes to listen to directly, and reviews from listeners. Rankings are updated daily for the United States.
