Samuel Lincoln Seder (born November 28, 1966) is an American actor, left-wing political commentator, and media host. His works include the film Who's the Caboose? (1997) as well as the television shows Beat Cops (2001) and Pilot Season (2004). He also appeared in Next Stop Wonderland (1998) and made guest appearances on Spin City (1997), Sex and the City (2000), America Undercover (2005), and Maron (2015). Since 2010, he has hosted a daily political talk show, The Majority Report with Sam Seder. He also voices Hugo, a recurring character on the animated comedy series Bob's Burgers.

Early life

Seder was born to a Jewish family in New York City, and raised in Worcester, Massachusetts, and is the oldest of three children. His father, J. Robert Seder, is a well-known lawyer in Worcester. Seder earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Religious Studies from Connecticut College and enrolled at Boston University School of Law. Disillusioned by the school’s commercialized culture, he dropped out of studying law to pursue a career in comedy. Seder became involved in the Boston comedy scene, associating with Janeane Garafalo, David Cross, Marc Maron and Sarah Silverman, whom he dated. These connections were used in his first film, Who's the Caboose?, which then led to Seder's appearances on comedy TV shows.

Career

In March 2004, Seder became co-host of Air America Radio's The Majority Report, alongside Janeane Garofalo until July 2006. During Mark Green's restructuring plan to transform Air America into a profitable leader in progressive talk radio, called "Air America 2.0", The Sam Seder Show was canceled on April 13, 2007, and replaced by WOR Radio Network late night radio show host Lionel. Seder was relegated to a Sunday show entitled Seder on Sunday. Lionel soon lost two-thirds of Seder's live affiliates and listenership. The final Seder on Sunday was broadcast on June 1, 2008. Seder also occasionally substituted for Randi Rhodes when Rhodes was on Air America, as well as Mike Malloy on The Mike Malloy Show on the Nova M Radio network. In 2008 he also began a collaboration with Marc Maron on Maron v. Seder, an hour-long video webcast. In January 2009, Maron v. Seder was renamed Breakroom Live with Maron & Seder and aired live from the kitchen in the Air America offices weekdays. Seder and Maron also hosted a post-show chat with viewers after each episode. Air America Media cancelled Breakroom Live with Maron & Seder in July 2009. In 2010, Air America was shut down. In November 2009, Seder hosted a pilot for NBC of an American version of Have I Got News for You. Three years later, in November 2012, it was announced Seder would again be the host of an American version of the show, this time on TBS. In November 2010, Seder began an independent online podcast, called The Seder Channel (later renamed The Majority Report w/Sam Seder). The live talk-show format closely matches the previous Air America program, with politically oriented commentary by Seder and co-hosts, and interviews with various guests. Seder offers listeners different tiered levels of access to content around the show via crowdfunding platform Patreon. In late 2010, Seder began occasionally serving as substitute host of Countdown with Keith Olbermann when Olbermann was on vacation. In December 2010, Seder also became co-host of the nationally syndicated progressive radio interview program Ring of Fire, co-hosted by Farron Cousins and Florida-based attorney Mike Papantonio. Seder also worked as a political contributor for MSNBC. The Majority Report was associated with the TYT Network, with which the show partnered, from the 2010 relaunch until 2020, which generally followed its original format but was rebooted as a viewer-funded production. Following those structural affiliation and funding-production changes, the show won a string of international People's Choice Podcast Awards, in five of the next seven annual competitions (2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, and 2017), for the "News and Politics" award.

2017 MSNBC controversy

In 2017, Mike Cernovich called attention to a subversive 2009 tweet by Seder and contacted multiple journalists asking them to write about the tweet. As a result, MSNBC initially decided not to renew Seder's contract despite Seder explaining that the tweet satirized a petition that had been circulating urging Roman Polanski's release from detention. Shortly afterward, MSNBC reversed its decision after getting pushback from journalists, and MSNBC's president said the initial decision to part ways had been wrong.

Personal life

On August 9, 2005, Seder's wife Nicole Cattell gave birth to their first child, daughter Myla Rae. On March 7, 2013, she gave birth to their second child, son Saul. On April 27, 2018, Seder announced that the couple were separated.

Filmography

Film

Television