Who is Mohammad bin Salman?

01/21/20 • 34 min

How did Saudi Arabia get away with the brutal murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the kidnapping and alleged torture of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, and even 9/11? How does it get away with war in Yemen and human rights violations at home? Oil, and the wealth that oil has brought about. On the first international episode of Who Is, Sean Morrow explores the 34-year-old trillionaire in charge of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman, and the story of a monarchy that is using its wealth to secure its global legitimacy--and expand its influence--through investments in Silicon Valley notables like Twitter, Uber, and Slack. Featuring Agnès Callamard, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extra-Judicial Executions, who investigated Khashoggi’s 2018 killing.

Hala Aldosari, Robert E. Wilhelm Fellow at the MIT Center for International Studies
Agnès Callamard, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extra-Judicial Executions and Director, Global Freedom of Expression, Columbia University
Steven A. Cook, Eni Enrico Mattei Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. His latest book is False Dawn: Protest, Democracy, and Violence in the New Middle East

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hala Aldosari, Robert E. Wilhelm Fellow at the MIT Center for International Studies
Agnès Callamard, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extra-Judicial Executions and Director, Global Freedom of Expression, Columbia University
Steven A. Cook, Eni Enrico Mattei Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. His latest book is False Dawn: Protest, Democracy, and Violence in the New Middle East

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Previous Episode

Who is Mark Esper?

In the United States, war is big business. The Department of Defense, led by Secretary Mark Esper since 2019, has a budget of $738 billion this year. And while many of those dollars pay for those who serve in the armed forces and the maintenance of a nuclear arsenal, a significant portion of that budget will go to the military-industrial complex, which President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned Americans about in his farewell address in 1961, and which, prior to his appointment, Secretary Esper represented in Washington as a lobbyist. With the question of war in the air after the United States--in a targeted drone strike on Iraqi soil approved by President Donald Trump--assassinated the second most powerful man in Iran, Qasem Soleimani, who stands to profit? On this episode of Who Is, Sean Morrow dives deep into Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and the military-industrial complex.

Kate Brannen, Editorial Director of Just Security
Jack Detsch, Pentagon Correspondent of Al-Monitor
Aaron Mehta, Deputy Editor and Senior Pentagon Correspondent of Defense News

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Next Episode

Who is Jared Kushner?

Jared Kushner, husband of Ivanka Trump, is probably the most powerful person in the United States who we know the least about. The grandchild of immigrants who escaped the Holocaust, Kushner is the beneficiary of his family’s meteoric rise, and the quintessential rich kid: before his donation-based admission to Harvard, Kushner hobnobbed with politicians and managed segments of his family’s vast real estate holdings. In graduate school, he bought a newspaper--and ran it into the ground--and a billion-dollar Manhattan office tower--which, until the election of President Donald Trump, nearly bankrupted the family business. But once his father-in-law is elected president, Kushner finds himself--or maneuvers his way into--the middle of everything, whether it’s building the wall, devising a solution to the Israel-Palestine imbroglio, or negotiating a trade deal with China. Featuring Andrea Bernstein, author of the newly released book American Oligarchs: The Kushners, the Trumps, and the Marriage of Money and Power.

Andrea Bernstein, co-host of the Trump Inc. podcast from WNYC and ProPublica, and author of American Oligarchs: The Kushners, the Trumps, and the Marriage of Money and Power
Daniel Golden, Senior Editor at ProPublica and author of The Price of Admission: How America's Ruling Class Buys Its Way into Elite Colleges—and Who Gets Left Outside the Gates
Vanessa Grigoriadis, host of Tabloid: The Making of Ivanka Trump and author of Blurred Lines: Rethinking Sex, Power and Consent on Campus