Amy Davidson Sorkin

New York

Staff Writer at The New Yorker

I'm a staff writer at The New Yorker magazine.

Articles

“Lovely One,” Reviewed: Justice Kentanji Brown Jackson’s Memoir

Oct 20, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

“Fools” is one of Neil Simon’s lesser plays. It involves a schoolmaster who, in some imaginary past, is sent to a Ukrainian village whose residents are burdened with a curse of stupidity. The comedy is broad. But in the nineteen-eighties a member of the Miami Palmetto Senior High School speech-and-debate team performed an extract, complete with an Eastern European accent, to great effect.
A Public Defender’s Radical Approach to Representing the January 6th Rioters

Oct 9, 2024 | newyorker.com | Andrea Kälin |Amy Davidson Sorkin

“You can see the Capitol from here,” Heather Shaner, a criminal-defense lawyer, says as she walks with her client Jack Griffith, a.k.a. Juan Bibiano, a.k.a. Liberty Dragon, to his sentencing hearing at the E. Barrett Prettyman Federal Courthouse, in Washington, D.C. “It’s beautiful, right?”“It is beautiful,” Griffith replies, as they pause to look at the vista, down one of D.C.’s wide streets. His hair is styled in a double-braided mohawk, half red and half blue.
Trump’s Got Troubles

Aug 18, 2024 | rsn.org | Amy Davidson Sorkin

His campaign is careening, his poll numbers are slipping, and, after something of a summer lull, he is due for several confrontations in court. On August 7th, as thousands of people gathered at an airfield in Michigan to see Vice-President Kamala Harris and her just-announced running mate, Governor Tim Walz, Donald Trump signed paperwork notifying the federal government that he would be suing the Department of Justice for a hundred million dollars.
Trump’s Got Troubles

Aug 17, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

On August 7th, as thousands of people gathered at an airfield in Michigan to see Vice-President Kamala Harris and her just-announced running mate, Governor Tim Walz, Donald Trump signed paperwork notifying the federal government that he would be suing the Department of Justice for a hundred million dollars.
The Supreme Court Needs Fixing, But How?

Aug 3, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

Politics, more than many fields, can be unjust.
Who Should Kamala Harris Pick as Her Running Mate?

Jul 22, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

It now seems almost certain that Vice-President Kamala Harris will be the Democratic nominee to face Donald Trump in November. But no one runs for President alone. Harris has the endorsement of President Joe Biden, after he withdrew from the Presidential race on Sunday, and of a list of notables that seems to be growing by the minute. Small donors have been flooding ActBlue, the Democratic fund-raising platform.
In Trump’s Documents Case, Aileen Cannon Tells Jack Smith to Go Away

Jul 16, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

In November, 2022, Attorney General Merrick Garland announced that he had asked Jack Smith to serve as a special counsel.
The Supreme Court’s Immunity Ruling is a Victory for Donald Trump

Jul 1, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

On Monday morning, the Supreme Court, by a vote of 6–3, handed Donald Trump, who is under indictment in multiple jurisdictions, a victory by declaring that former Presidents have a great deal of immunity from criminal prosecution related to their actions while in office.
The Supreme Court Steps Back from the Brink on Guns

Jun 22, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

One day, in December, 2019, a woman known in court documents as C.M. was berated by Zackey Rahimi, a man with whom she had a young child, in a parking lot in Arlington, Texas. C.M. tried to get away, but Rahimi allegedly grabbed her and dragged her to his car and forced her inside, hitting her head against the dashboard in the process. Before he could drive off, Rahimi noticed that another person in the parking lot had witnessed his assault.
What’s Holding Up Trump’s Florida Case?

May 9, 2024 | newyorker.com | Amy Davidson Sorkin

On Tuesday, Judge Aileen Cannon, of the Southern District of Florida, said that she simply does not know when Donald Trump will go to trial in her courtroom. Jack Smith, the special counsel, had charged Trump with thirty-two counts under the Espionage Act, for allegedly hoarding national-security documents at Mar-a-Lago, and with another eight counts involving obstruction and false statements. The trial had tentatively been set for May 20th.