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The 36th Annual Richard W. Leopold Lecture will be delivered by Nina Totenberg, NPR’s Award-Winning Legal Affairs Correspondent Famous for Her Supreme Court coverage; Author of Dinners With Ruth (2022), on October 21, 2025, at 5 pm CT at Cahn Auditorium. 

The lecture is free and open to the public. 

Nina Totenberg shines a light on the inner workings of our nation's highest court and helps audiences understand the impact of headline-making judicial cases on America’s future. One of the country’s most respected journalists and a dean of the press corps covering the Supreme Court, Nina is National Public Radio’s award-winning legal affairs correspondent. With more than 40 years’ experience at NPR, her reports are regularly featured on NPR's All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and Weekend Edition. 

Nina has won every major journalism award in broadcasting and holds the distinction of being the first radio journalist to have won the National Press Foundation’s “Broadcaster of the Year” award. In 2023 she was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame by the Museum of Broadcast Communications. 

Referred to as “the crème de la crème” of NPR by Newsweek, Nina shares her seasoned reflections on the Supreme Court, top legal issues affecting everyday Americans, and the important cases being considered by the court. In-depth and wildly thought-provoking, her deep experience and nuanced perspective provides audiences insight into today’s judicial headlines like no one else can. 

A tribute and testament to her nearly 50-year friendship with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Nina’s memoir, Dinners With Ruth: A Memoir on the Power of Friendships, was published by Simon & Schuster in September of 2022.