The Fall's Gonna Kill You
White House Counsel Oliver Babish ruthlessly interrogates C.J. and Abbey over their roles in concealing President Bartlet's MS diagnosis, while senior staff covertly poll public tolerance for the lie and brace for legal subpoenas and political annihilation.
Dawn cracks over the White House Counsel's office as Oliver Babish corners C.J. Cregg, her defenses cracking under his relentless probe: Has she lied about the President's health? Her admission—'Many, many times'—ignites the fuse on a scandal threatening to engulf the Bartlet administration. Six hours into knowing about the MS, C.J. spars with the bulldog lawyer, her sarcasm a shield against accusations of complicity in federal crimes. Smash to main titles, tension already throttling.
Josh's bullpen buzzes with Donna's panic over a fax: NASA's Zodiac satellite plummets from orbit, a garbage-truck-sized specter hurtling toward Earth. Laughter ripples—Ed and Larry mock her terror—but the real apocalypse looms inside. Leo stonewalls Toby and Josh's pleas for polling on public reaction to the MS bombshell, fearing leaks, yet greenlights Joey Lucas's clandestine survey disguised as attitudes toward a Michigan governor's hidden degenerative disease.
Martin Connelly storms Josh's office, begging $30 million for the tobacco lawsuit draining Justice Department coffers against Big Tobacco's war chest. Josh pitches Leo, who balks at the fiscal black hole and congressional tobacco puppets blocking transfers. Meanwhile, Sam battles Progressive Caucus aides over clunky rhetoric in his SME speech—'bigger swimming pools and faster private jets' for the rich—dissing their class-warrior barbs as high-school drivel. CBO's slashed surplus projection hands them leverage: slower growth kills fat tax cuts for the wealthy.
Abbey Bartlet barrels back from her trip, fury erupting in the Oval as Jed confesses withholding the MS from her, triggered by Zoey's Georgetown form exposing the family medical blank. 'How come I just found out?' she demands, their spousal armor fracturing amid exhaustion and fear. Babish hauls her in next, dismantling her 'I signed it without reading' defense with her MD credentials: a thoracic surgeon blind to a medical history form? MS isn't hereditary, she snaps, but Oliver warns of grand jury meat grinders ahead.
Airport shadows cloak Josh's desperate pitch to Joey: 96 hours for a blind poll modeling Bartlet's lie. She nods, steely. Night deepens; Donna hounds Charlie on Zodiac's plutonium peril, oblivious to its routine skyfall. Abbey confides in C.J., both battle-scarred by Babish's vetting. Leo briefs Bartlet: poll's in field, Sam's summoned last. Toby echoes his vow to wait post-reveal.
C.J. bolts into the night, Josh trailing. 'The President has this disease and has been lying about it,' she erupts, 'and you guys worry polling optics? It's the fall that's gonna kill ya!'—her slip from 'you' to 'us' binds them in shared doom. Josh deflects with Donna's satellite hysteria: 17,000 objects have rained down harmlessly; we're due. Pennsylvania Avenue sign fades to black, the plummet inevitable. Subplots—satellite farce, tobacco crusade, tax-cut trench warfare—underscore the core dread: disclosure's cliff-dive into indictments, betrayal, oblivion. Staff clings to bonds fraying under truth's gravity, the fall devouring all.
Events in This Episode
The narrative beats that drive the story
Dawn breaks over the White House Counsel's office, but no light penetrates the grim reality as Oliver Babish, the White House Counsel, relentlessly corners C.J. Cregg. His surgical questions dissect her role in the President's concealed MS diagnosis, forcing her to confront her complicity. C.J. parries with sharp wit and sarcasm, a fragile shield against the mounting legal peril. Babish, unyielding, dismantles her defenses, revealing the administration's deep-seated deception. He lays bare the stakes: a grand jury, Justice Department subpoenas, and the crushing weight of federal crimes. The air crackles with unspoken accusations and the threat of personal and political annihilation. C.J.'s forced admission—'Many, many times'—shatters the illusion of innocence, igniting the fuse on a scandal that threatens to consume them all. This opening thrust establishes the core conflict and the immediate, terrifying consequences of the President's lie, setting a tone of urgent dread.
In Josh's chaotic bullpen, Donna professionally greets waiting Martin Connelly, multitasks weather checks amid staff bustle, then falls victim to Ed and Larry's prank fax from NASA about a massive …
Emerging from a tense meeting with Leo, Josh meets the impassioned Assistant AG Martin Connelly, who reveals the Justice Department's crippling cash shortage in its monumental fraud lawsuit against Big …
In Leo's office, Toby and Josh urgently demand polling to assess public reaction to Bartlet's MS cover-up—debating perceptions of physical unfitness versus outright deception. Leo resists overt polls until press …
As Leo reluctantly approves Josh's covert 'beets' poll through Joey Lucas amid Toby's deepening paranoia—'I don't trust anybody right now'—Donna urgently calls Josh from outside Leo's office with a fax …
In the White House Counsel's office, Oliver Babish plays a tape of C.J.'s fabricated press briefing on President Bartlet's pristine health, ruthlessly probing how often she's repeated this ritual—estimating at …
Amid Oliver Babish's relentless dissection of C.J.'s scripted health briefings and probing for legal deniability, a staffer knocks and delivers an urgent note from the frantic Donna Moss. C.J. reads …
The White House bullpen buzzes with a false alarm as Donna Moss panics over a NASA fax detailing a plummeting Chinese satellite, a farcical counterpoint to the true crisis unfolding. Leo McGarry, battling rising internal pressure, stonewalls Toby and Josh's demands for immediate public polling on the MS bombshell, fearing catastrophic leaks. Yet, a clandestine strategy emerges: Josh secures Leo's reluctant approval for Joey Lucas to conduct a blind poll, masked as a survey on 'subsurface agricultural products.' Meanwhile, Martin Connelly, a desperate Assistant Attorney General, storms Josh's office, pleading for $30 million to salvage the Justice Department's losing battle against Big Tobacco. The administration's financial and political vulnerabilities are laid bare as Josh grapples with Leo's refusal to fund a seemingly unwinnable fight. C.J. endures another brutal interrogation by Babish, who dissects her past press briefings, weaponizing her carefully chosen words and the 'sky is falling' fax, deepening her complicity and isolation. The act escalates the internal machinations and the personal cost of the cover-up.
Abbey Bartlet emerges tensely from her limousine on the White House portico, exchanging clipped greetings and light banter with aides about her trip—christening a medevac helicopter—before striding purposefully to the …
Abbey Bartlet storms into the Oval Office after her tense arrival, confronting President Bartlet about his failure to disclose the MS cover-up involving Zoey's Georgetown form, which she unknowingly signed …
Sam Seaborn confronts the Progressive Caucus aides, battling their clunky, class-warfare rhetoric for his SME speech. A sudden CBO projection of a significantly reduced budget surplus unexpectedly hands him leverage, transforming a fiscal setback into a political opportunity for tax cut negotiations. He fiercely defends his narrative control, refusing to dilute the President's message with their 'bigger swimming pools and faster private jets' barbs, asserting his own principles and experience. The First Lady, Abbey Bartlet, barrels back from her trip, her fury erupting in the Oval Office as Jed confesses his withholding of the MS diagnosis, triggered by Zoey's Georgetown form. Their spousal armor fractures under the weight of exhaustion and fear, revealing the profound betrayal within their marriage. Babish then hauls Abbey into his office, ruthlessly dismantling her 'I signed it without reading' defense, weaponizing her MD credentials against her. He paints a stark picture of grand jury scrutiny, leaving her utterly shell-shocked by the sheer scale of the impending legal and public onslaught. The personal and political stakes spiral, revealing the deep fissures within both the administration and the Bartlet marriage.
In a tense exchange at Margaret's desk transitioning to Leo's office, Josh probes Leo about First Lady Abbey's return, prompting Leo's guilty admission that he accidentally revealed Zoey's Harvard application …
At Margaret's desk, Josh probes Leo about the First Lady's return; Leo admits accidentally revealing Zoey's Harvard application before Bartlet could tell her, exposing family tensions. Josh urgently pitches $30 …
Josh Lyman, under the cloak of airport shadows, desperately pitches Joey Lucas: 96 hours to execute a blind poll, modeling public tolerance for Bartlet's lie by substituting a Michigan governor with a hidden degenerative disease. Joey, steely and pragmatic, accepts the impossible task, fully aware of the looming grand jury subpoenas. Back at the White House, Donna's escalating panic over the Zodiac satellite's plutonium peril provides a frantic, almost farcical counterpoint to the administration's internal implosion. Abbey Bartlet, battle-scarred by Babish's probe, confides in C.J., revealing C.J.'s own past suspicions of Bartlet's secret injections, binding them in shared vulnerability. Leo briefs Bartlet on the poll's deployment, sparking the President's concern about the optics of his voluntary disclosure appearing poll-driven. Leo then summons Sam, who Toby advises to wait in his office, signaling Sam's imminent induction into the inner circle of the MS secret. C.J. finally erupts to Josh on Pennsylvania Avenue, her raw anguish exposing the true gravity: 'The President has this disease and has been lying about it, and you guys worry polling optics? It's the fall that's gonna kill ya!' Her slip from 'you' to 'us' binds them in shared doom, as the plummet towards disclosure becomes inevitable, underscored by Josh's deflective, morbid joke about the satellite's impending, yet harmless, crash.
In a tense yet humorous walk-and-talk, Donna urgently briefs Charlie on the falling Chinese satellite they've tracked for years, defending anonymous embassy calls amid Chinese media silence and questioning U.S. …
Fresh from speculating with Charlie about a plutonium-armed Chinese satellite, hyper-anxious Donna encounters the exhausted Abbey in a fleeting walk-and-talk. After perfunctory greetings and noting Abbey's trip highlight—a MedEvac helicopter …