The Melting Pod

Confessions of an Immigration Bureaucrat, with Michael Valverde

Every year, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) makes millions of highly consequential decisions that affect individual people’s lives. Applications for gre

Three Big Lies About Immigrants and Fraud, with Sonya Schwartz

From the first moments of his first campaign for president, Donald Trump has accused immigrants of fraudulently obtaining public benefits, immigration protections, and ev

A Winning Message on Immigration, with Beatriz Lopez

In the 2024 presidential election, Republicans spent nearly $600 million on political advertisements pounding Biden (and then Harris) for botching the border. The Democra

The Reality-Based Economics of Immigration, with Jenny Hunt

Jenny Hunt is a Rutgers University professor, the former Chief Economist at the Department of Labor, and a key contributor to the gold-standard, 600-page consensus report

News Digest: Green Card Chaos, Hunger Strikes, and Stern Dad Energy

We dive underneath the latest immigration headlines to make sense of the senseless. Why did the Trump administration threaten to shut down U.S. green card processing? Why

The Truth About ICE, with Jason Houser

From calls to abolish ICE to deeply held misconceptions about immigration and criminality, few agencies generate more heat and less light than Immigration and Customs Enf

Who’s Afraid of the H-1B?

The H-1B is a white-collar work visa, essentially unchanged by Congress since 1990 – before the birth of the first text message, the first website, and 40% of our populat

DACA and the Dreamer Movement, with Felicia Escobar Carrillo

You may know about the plight of Dreamers – over 3 million undocumented individuals who were brought here as children and are Americans in every way but immigration statu

The Heartbreak of Immigration Reform, with Esther Olavarria

Everyone knows that our immigration system is broken, so why hasn’t Congress fixed it for over 35 years? What you may not know is how close we came to comprehensive immig

Biden and the Border (Part 2), with Charanya Krishnaswami

You don’t serve four years as a senior official in Biden’s Department of Homeland Security without seeing some things. This episode is Part 2 of Charanya Krishnaswami’s

Biden and the Border (Part 1), with Charanya Krishnaswami

Nobody’s happy with how the Biden administration handled the U.S./Mexico border, but it’s hard to find an honest reckoning. That’s why you need to hear the story of Char

Welcome to The Melting Pod

The Melting Pod brings you stories of our dysfunctional immigration system, and where we go from here.  In this inaugural episode, Claire reveals how everything going on

Trailer: What is The Melting Pod?

The Melting Pod brings you stories of our dysfunctional immigration system, and where we go from here. Join experts Claire Trickler-McNulty, Amanda Baran, and Doug Rand,