WCPT 820 Weekend

The Turi Ryder Show 03.15.26

·51 min·5 clips
A Belarusian playwright in exile explains how Ukraine first hosted him after he was pushed out by dictator Lukashenko.
The episode opens with host Tori Ryder's monologue touching on Chicago's dyed river and her self-deprecating humor before introducing the main guest. Belarusian playwright Andre Kurechik explains he was pushed into exile in 2020 by dictator Lukashenko and found refuge first in Ukraine. He wrote 'An Ocean Away' in Minneapolis for a prosthetics clinic helping Ukrainian war victims. The play features real interviews with survivors, including a mother who fled with her son after he lost an arm to a Russian tank shell. Kurechik describes the diverse refugee waves from Ukraine spanning Stalin's era to the current war. The staged reading at Victory Gardens Theater on March 21st will benefit the Prosthet Foundation and Self Reliance Association. After the interview, constitutional law professor David Levine discusses a Minnesota judge's ruling that found ICE engaged in racial profiling against U.S. citizens with ethnic names. Levine analyzes Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson's criticism of the shadow docket favoring the Trump administration. The conversation shifts to military legal oversight, noting how JAG lawyers preventing civilian casualties are being reassigned to immigration cases. Host and guest critique FCC Chairman Brendan Carr's threats to broadcast licenses over coverage of the Iran conflict. The episode concludes with reflections on legal erosion and parallels to authoritarian tactics.

As heard by us

A loose but affecting radio hour pairs sharp media questions with a guest's devastating account of war and survival.

WCPT's Tori Ryder hour starts in a casual place, with a joke about a control-room colleague's haircut and a green river dyed by the Plumbers Local, then turns toward a harder question: how public language shapes the way war is understood. That swing gives the episode its charge.

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Why you'd press play

You want radio that can joke about a still-green river, admit an awkward mic-side embarrassment, then sit with a war story without losing its human pulse.

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