Alan Dershowitz on Unrest in LA, Trump-Harvard Clash, and New Book ‘The Preventive State’

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This is the full version of Jan Jekielek’s interview with Alan Dershowitz. The longer-form version was released on Epoch TV on June 14, 2025.

Say we had credible intelligence about an impending terrorist attack or major acts of violence, what actions are justifiable to prevent these crimes from occurring? How do we balance the urgency of preventing harm, with the importance of safeguarding civil liberties?

“We have to make trade-offs all the time, and there’s no jurisprudence to that trade-off. We live in the preventive state,” says Alan Dershowitz, professor emeritus at Harvard Law School. “We are moving more and more toward replacing deterrence and reaction with prevention.”

He is the author of the new book, “The Preventive State: The Challenge of Preventing Serious Harms While Preserving Essential Liberties.”

Should someone charged—but not convicted—with a serious crime be denied bail to potentially prevent further crimes? Should governments be able to compel inoculations in a scenario where that could actually prevent deadly contagion? And notably, a few days after this interview was filmed, Israel launched preemptive strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. When is such preventive military action warranted?

In this episode, Dershowitz discusses the legal framework laid out in his new book—which he describes as the most important work he’s ever written. He talks about the debate around deploying the National Guard in Los Angeles, the Trump administration’s clash with Harvard University, the dilemma of tackling Chinese espionage on college campuses, and the growing erosion of free speech protections in Europe.

CHAPTER TITLES
0:00:00 - Introduction to the Preventive State
0:00:33 - The Challenge of Prevention: Balancing Good and Bad
0:01:09 - Personal Challenges and Academic Censorship
0:02:26 - Historical Examples of Preventive Actions
0:04:13 - The Trump Hush Money Case as a Legal Contortion
0:07:54 - The Minority Report Scenario in Real Life
0:09:31 - Riots and Military Intervention: A Preventive Dilemma
0:12:46 - Balancing Justice: Guilty vs. Innocent
0:15:06 - Preventing Foreign Threats: The Chinese Talent Program
0:16:40 - Technology and the Rise of Preventive Measures
0:20:41 - Pandemic Response and Individual Liberty
0:26:19 - Transparency and Expert Testimony
0:27:41 - The Jacobson Case and Compulsory Inoculations
0:35:08 - The Fear Factor in Modern Society
0:36:11 - Academic Censorship and Cancel Culture
0:43:34 - Preventive Legal Frameworks and Bail Reform
0:45:00 - The Origins of Rights
0:48:39 - Immigration and Preventive Policies
0:56:22 - Foreign Students and National Security
1:00:16 - Free Speech and Incitement
1:04:07 - International Perspectives on Free Speech
1:08:39 - Concluding Thoughts on the Preventive State

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