The F Word: America’s Foster Care Crisis | Episode 2 | Katie Padilla and Josh Gupta-Kagan
October 8, 2026
The F Word: America’s Foster Care Crisis | Episode 2 | Katie Padilla and Josh Gupta-Kagan
When a child enters the child welfare system, who decides what happens next? And in a courtroom full of adults acting in the child’s best interest, who speaks for the child?
In this episode of The F Word, Rob Scheer talks with attorney Katie Padilla and Professor Josh Gupta-Kagan about the decisions that can change a child’s life.
Katie has worked with children immediately after removal from their families and has represented both parents and children in dependency court. She takes us inside the courtroom to discuss judicial discretion, the influence of caseworkers and attorneys, the line between poverty and neglect, and the trauma the system can cause even when it aims to protect.
Professor Gupta-Kagan, founder of the Family Defense Clinic at Columbia Law School, examines the power of child protective intervention. Rob shares his own family’s frightening experience as they discuss investigations that begin before the facts are known, barriers to reunification, and what Professor Gupta-Kagan calls America’s “hidden foster care system.”
Read Pete Buttigieg’s firsthand account of the CPS investigation discussed in this episode.
THIS WEEK’S “F WORD” QUESTIONS
Katie: Have you ever walked out of a courtroom believing the wrong decision had just been made? When the system gets it wrong, who pays the price?
Professor Gupta-Kagan: What’s more dangerous: leaving a child in a home that may not be safe, or removing a child from a family that could have stayed together safely?
“Legal representation should never leave a person feeling more broken than it found them.” — Katie Padilla
ABOUT THE GUESTS
Katie Padilla is the founder of Bloom Family Law and a Certified Family Law Specialist. She has represented parents and children in dependency court and serves on the board of CASA of Monterey County.
Website: https://bloomlegalcoach.com/
Professor Josh Gupta-Kagan is a Clinical Professor of Law and founder of the Family Defense Clinic at Columbia Law School. His work examines family regulation, parental rights, foster care, and the effects of child welfare policy on families. He appears in this episode in his personal capacity, not on behalf of Columbia Law School.
NEXT ON THE F WORD
Subscribe to Comfort Cases and follow along with The F Word: America’s Foster Care Crisis, a five-part series examining the realities of America’s foster care system through the voices of former foster youth, foster parents, attorneys, advocates, researchers, and child welfare leaders.
To find out more about Comfort Cases, please visit our website: www.comfortcases.org.
You can also follow us on our social media channels:
To listen to previous episodes of Fostering Change and Comfort Cases: Unpacked, please visit: www.comfortcases.org/podcast or your favorite podcast outlets.