The Lawfare Podcast

On March 27, the Biden administration issued an Executive Order on Prohibition on Use by the United States Government of Commercial Spyware that Poses Risks to National Security. The Executive Order, as the title says, limits executive departments and agencies from using commercial spyware if they determine that its use would present a counterintelligence or security risk to the U.S., or if it poses significant risks of improper use by a foreign government or person. To talk about the new executive order and its impact, Eugenia Lostri, Lawfare’s Fellow in Technology Policy and Law, sat down with Winnona DeSombre Bernsen, nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council. They talked about why this executive order is a welcomed development, how spyware companies might adjust their behavior in response, and what remains to be done to limit the misuse of these technologies.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For months, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been promising a set of legal reforms favored by partners in his far-right coalition government that many fear would spell the end of liberal democracy in the state of Israel. But this week, these efforts hit a roadblock in the form of an unprecedented degree of popular resistance—one that ultimately led Netanyahu to put his reform proposals on hold, at least for the moment.On Wednesday, Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Natan Sachs convened a panel of experts to discuss these fast-moving developments, including his Brookings colleagues Amos Harel, a leading Israeli military and defense expert, and Shibley Telhami, the Anwar Sadat Professor of Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, and leading Israeli journalist and legal expert Ilana Dayan. To give you some additional background, Lawfare Senior Editor and Brookings Fellow Scott R. Anderson sat down with Natan separately to lay out recent developments and their significance. That conversation will come first, and the panel discussion will follow.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tatyana Bolton is a Security Policy Manager working on cybersecurity at Google, and Dave Kleidermacher is the Vice President of Android Security & Privacy at Google. They are among the people at Google who are thinking about IoT, that is, Internet of Things security and privacy. They sat down with Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes to talk about Google's thinking on how to create a secure environment for all those little things that we have traveling with us, connected to our computers, running our houses, all connected to the internet, and all using different standards of security. How do we prevent them from being hijacked and turned into botnets? How do we prevent them from spying on us? How do we get them observing similar standards of security, and how do we do this across dozens of different countries, jurisdictions and regulatory environments, and platforms?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

States are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence systems to enhance their national security decision-making. The real risks that states will deploy unlawful or unreliable national security AI make international regulations seem appealing, but what's the right model for them?Ashley Deeks is the Class of 1948 Professor of Scholarly Research in Law at the University of Virginia Law School. She's just published a paper for Laware's ongoing Digital Social Contract research paper series, in which she argues that, instead of looking to nuclear arms control as the model for national security AI regulation, states should look to how cyber operations are regulated. Lawfare Senior Editor Alan Rozenshtein spoke with Ashley about her research and what a successful regulatory regime for national security AI would look like.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On the latest episode of Arbiters of Truth, Lawfare's series on the information ecosystem, Quinta Jurecic and Alan Rozenshtein spoke with Ravi Iyer, the Managing Director of the Psychology of Technology Institute at the University of Southern California's Neely Center.Earlier in his career, Ravi held a number of positions at Meta, where he worked to make Facebook's algorithm provide actual value, not just "engagement," to users. Quinta and Alan spoke with Ravi about why he thinks that content moderation is a dead-end and why thinking about the design of technology is the way forward to make sure that technology serves us and not the other way around.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Rational Security, Alan, Quinta, and Scott waited for a big shoe to drop by talking over the week's big national security news, including:“What Else Can I Get Away With on Fifth Avenue...” Donald Trump is expected to become the first former president to be indicted on criminal charges this week—if, that is, local authorities are not deterred by the public protests Trump’s supporters are preparing to hold in New York City at his request. What will this move mean for the country? And how might it end? “Territorial Refute.” After weeks of avoiding the issue, likely 2024 Republican presidential contender Ron Desantis adopted the position that supporting Ukraine—which he described as being involved in a “territorial dispute”—is not a vital U.S. interest, bringing him into alignment with former President Trump and signaling a strong lean towards isolationism in the 2024 Republican field. What will this mean for the likely candidates? And for U.S. support for Ukraine moving forward?“The ‘Blood, Treasure, and Regret’ Anniversary.” This past week marked the 20th anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, which set out to remove a dictator and welcome a new wave of democracy in the Middle East—but has instead resulted in an Iraq that is still recovering from years of sectarian violence and increasingly under Iran’s influence. What is the legacy of the decision to invade? And what does it mean for U.S. foreign policy moving forward?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From April 28, 2021: The Biden administration has now responded to two major cyberattacks—one from Russia, the SolarWinds attack, and the other from China, the so-called Hafnium Microsoft Exchange Server attack. Recently, Lawfare has run articles on both of these incidents—a piece from Dmitri Alperovitch, the co-founder and former CTO of CrowdStrike, and a piece from Alex Iftimie, a former Justice Department official and a lawyer at Morrison & Foerster. They joined Benjamin Wittes to discuss the Biden administration's response to the attacks. Were they appropriate, both in absolute terms and in relation to each other? Do they send the right messages to the countries in question? Do they go far enough? And what more do we want to see?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Last month, the Government Accountability Office released its latest report on the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, focusing on the failures of several government agencies to fully process and share information about a potential attack in the days and weeks leading up to January 6, 2021.Lawfare Senior Editor and Brookings Senior Fellow Molly Reynolds sat down with NBC News Justice Reporter Ryan Reilly, who's reported broadly on law enforcement issues related to Jan. 6, and Lawfare Senior Editor Quinta Jurecic. They discussed what we know about how and why law enforcement struggled in the lead-up to the insurrection and the challenges for the road ahead.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The open nature of the internet has allowed malicious actors to abuse technology. Information operations, offensive cyber, and IP theft are just some examples of this misuse. The Biden administration has pursued an industrial policy that hopes to counter the weaponization of globalized systems. This approach includes technology subsidies, export controls, and rethinking supply chains. But this approach could undermine efforts to advance global rules and values.To discuss how the United States can push back while bolstering democracy and human rights, Eugenia Lostri, Lawfare’s Fellow in Technology Policy and Law, sat down with former Ambassador Karen Kornbluh, Managing Director of the Digital Innovation and Democracy Initiative and Senior Fellow with the German Marshall Fund. Ambassador Kornbluh is the lead author on the new GMF report “The New American Foreign Policy of Technology.” They discussed why there’s a need to rethink American foreign policy, how to center democratic values, and the crucial role of a multistakeholder approach.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On December 31, 2023, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) will expire unless it is reauthorized by Congress. Section 702 authorizes the U.S. government, in order to obtain foreign intelligence information, to target foreigners who are reasonably believed to be outside of the U.S. and collect their communications inside the U.S. without a warrant—even when such surveillance may involve the incidental collection of communications of U.S. persons. Privacy and civil liberties advocates have long raised concerns about the government's ability to conduct so-called backdoor searches of U.S. person information acquired incidentally through the collection of the communications of foreigners. U.S.government officials have argued that it is imperative for Congress to reauthorize Section 702. To talk about Section 702 and its reauthorization, Lawfare Senior Editor Stephanie Pell sat down with Travis LeBlanc, a Member of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board and a partner at Cooley LLP. They discussed his concerns with the way the government may search or use U.S. person information incidentally collected under Section 702, the aspects of the government's position on reauthorization on which he may agree, and how he believes Congress should reform Section 702. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

By many accounts, the United States is living through a new era of competition—not just between major powers and strategic rivals, but between ideologies. Around the world, many authoritarian governments seem to be on the rise, even as many liberal democracies are facing a crisis of confidence, including, by some accounts, here in the United States.In a new book entitled, “Defeating the Dictators,” Charles Dunst, a former journalist and current deputy director of research and analytics at The Asia Group, lays out what he sees as the right strategy for making democracies more effective and defeating the appeal of authoritarian government. Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sat down with him to discuss his new book, the importance he places on Singapore as a case study, and how the domestic remedies he focuses on translate into foreign policy.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Twenty years ago today, the United States invaded the nation of Iraq, intent on removing the regime of dictator Saddam Hussein and installing a stable democratic government. What followed instead was two decades of political instability and horrible sectarian violence that has yielded a modern Iraqi state that remains plagued with corruption and other problems, and is increasingly under immense pressure from the nearby regime in Iran.To gain perspective on the legacy of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and how it continues to shape the relationship between the two countries today, Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sat down for conversations with two individuals whose personal and professional lives have been intimately tied up in the last two decades of the U.S.-Iraq relationship. First, Scott sat down with Ambassador Doug Silliman, who is now the president of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, and who previously served in numerous capacities in Iraq, including as ambassador, over his decades-long career as a U.S. diplomat. Scott then sat down with Salem Chalabi, an individual who has held numerous positions across several administrations in the Iraqi government over the past two decades, most recently serving as the head of the Trade Bank of Iraq until January of this year. In each conversation, they discuss the legacy of the U.S. invasion, how it impacts the bilateral relationship today, and the central role Iran has come to play in the country.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Academy loves a good spy flick, and so do we! This week, Shane Harris talks with Washington Post culture critic Alyssa Rosenberg about the enduring power of espionage on the big screen. Movies like Zero Dark Thirty, the Mission: Impossible franchise, and this year’s Top Gun: Maverick and All Quiet on the Western Front, which both took home Oscars, help us understand global conflict as they wrestle with questions of personal morality. How do the stories of James Bond and George Smiley help us make sense of the fate of nations? And why is Hollywood finding it nearly impossible to tell stories about great power competition between the U.S. and China? Shane and Alyssa go way back, and this is a fun, lively conversation about spy stories that have resonated through the decades. Alyssa has written for years about popular culture, books, and more recently parenting. Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From February 24, 2020: What do Russia, China and Canada all have in common? They all disagree—in one manner or another—with American policy goals in the Arctic, where climate change is driving opportunities and challenges for U.S. policy-makers. In this episode, National Security Institute Visiting Fellow and former senior intelligence official Jim Danoy discusses his paper, “The Arctic: Securing the High Ground,” with host Lester Munson. They discuss the fascinating policy dilemmas posed by the unique geography of the North Pole and how the United States can exploit new opportunities to maximum benefit.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Artificial Intelligence is advancing at what seems like an exponential rate, with every month—sometimes every week—bringing news of a new, game-changing discovery. But just as the progress in AI is accelerating, so is the pessimism about it, with many scholars, commentators, and technologists themselves raising the alarm about AI's potential harms to equality, privacy, and security.Challenging this consensus is Orly Lobel, a law professor at the University of San Diego and the author of the new book, "The Equality Machine: Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future." Lawfare Senior Editor Alan Rozenshtein sat down with Orly to discuss her book, why she's optimistic about AI's potential to advance equality, and what the government can do to help.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As U.S. counterterrorism efforts have waned in Yemen, Libya, and parts of Pakistan, Somalia has emerged as the most active element in the “forever wars” that the U.S. has waged since 9/11, according to Eric Schmitt of the New York Times. Schmitt traveled to Somalia in February for a rare embed with U.S. Special Operations forces on the ground in the midst of a recent offensive launched by the Somali government against a formidable enemy, Al Shabab.Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien sat down with Eric and his Times colleague Charlie Savage to discuss the conflict in the Horn of Africa and the extent of U.S. military involvement there. They discussed the roots of the Shabab insurgency, whether or not the current moment marks an inflection point in the fight, the legal grounds on which the U.S. government justifies its campaign, and why the American public and government alike should pay more attention to Somalia.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As Director of the United States Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Jen Easterly is one of several women at the very top of the cybersecurity pyramid in the United States. A graduate of West Point, decorated U.S. Army officer, and a Rhodes Scholar, Jen has served her country in a plethora of senior cybersecurity and counterterrorism roles, and most recently before her return to government, was the head of Firm Resilience at Morgan Stanley. David Kris, Lawfare contributor and former Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division, and Bryan Cunningham, Lawfare contributor and Executive Director of the University of California, Irvine’s Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute, sat down with Jen to talk about everything cybersecurity, about the need for revolutionary new approaches to emerging threats to our cyber and national security, the recent U.S. National Cyber Strategy, the cyber offense/defense flywheel, and even where her avatar got her cape. Jen also talks about CISA’s priorities for the coming years, new cyber incident reporting requirements, and new cybersecurity help coming to a city near you. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For years, the international community has wrestled with how to reconcile sanctions policies targeting terrorist groups and other malevolent actors with the need to provide humanitarian assistance in areas under those groups’ control. Late last year, both the Biden administration and the UN Security Council took major steps toward a new approach on this issue, installing broad carveouts for humanitarian assistance into existing sanctions regimes. To talk through these changes, Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sat down with two leading sanctions experts: Rachel Alpert, a Partner at the law firm Jenner & Block and former State Department attorney, and Alex Zerden, the Founder and Principal of Capitol Peak Strategies and a former Treasury Department official, including at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. They talked about the long-standing issues surrounding humanitarian assistance, what these changes may mean in jurisdictions like Afghanistan, and where more changes may yet be forthcoming. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chip Brantley and Andrew Beck Grace are the creators of the NPR audio documentary White Lies, which was a Pulitzer finalist for its first season. Chip and Andrew are back for season 2, a story they began reporting in 2015 after they stumbled on an archival photo of a prison riot in Talladega, Alabama. This season focuses on the Mariel boatlift, a 6-month period in 1980 during which 125,000 Cubans emigrated to the United States to seek asylum. What they found is as much an American immigration story as a history of American immigration—and the laws that govern it.Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien sat down with Chip and Andrew to discuss the legal fictions that prop up the U.S. immigration system, how a country with due process under the law justifies detaining people indefinitely, and their obsession with Lady Bird Johnson’s White House audio diaries.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Rational Security, Alan, Quinta, and Scott were joined by Naval Academy professor and cyberlaw expert Jeff "Two Effs" Kosseff to work through the week's big national security news stories, including:“Dox Populi.” Florida’s state legislature is the latest of several to propose laws requiring individuals involved in certain online activities to reveal their identities to the state. Are these requirements consistent with the First Amendment? What would they mean for civil society where they apply?“Recommend Forward.” The Biden administration has rolled out what some had previewed as a historic new cyber strategy. But it’s left some experts cold, in part because it seems to hinge on future enactments by a cooperative Congress—something that may not be in the cards. How revolutionary is it really?“Forget It, Jake. It’s the Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party.” The House select committee on China held its first hearing last week to much fanfare. How much is it a partisan political exercise? And to what degree might it actually steer U.S. policy on China in a better (or worse) direction?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From March 19, 2021: Jack Goldsmith spoke with New York Times cybersecurity reporter Nicole Perlroth about her new book, "This is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race." They discussed the dark world of markets for zero-day vulnerabilities that are so vital in offensive cyber operations, the history of the markets, how they work, who the players are and why the United States doesn't control as much as it used to. They also discussed broader issues of U.S. cybersecurity policy, including the recent SolarWinds hack.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kemba Walden recently took over from Chris Inglis as Acting National Cyber Director in the White House. She had been Principal Deputy Assistant National Cyber Director after serving in multiple cybersecurity positions in government and in the private sector.David Kris, Lawfare contributor and former Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division, and Bryan Cunningham, Lawfare contributor and Executive Director of the University of California, Irvine’s Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute, sat down with Kemba to talk about the challenges and opportunities of her new role, the recently released U.S. National Cyber Strategy and the significant policy changes it announces, threats to our national and economic security from China, and a fairly long discussion of music theory.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During recent oral arguments in Gonzalez v. Google, a Supreme Court case concerning the scope of liability protections for internet platforms, Justice Neil Gorsuch asked a thought-provoking question. Does Section 230, the statute that shields websites from liability for third-party content, apply to a generative AI model like ChatGPT?  Luckily, Matt Perault of the Center on Technology Policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill had already been thinking about this question and published a Lawfare article arguing that 230’s protections wouldn’t extend to content generated by AI. Lawfare Senior Editors Quinta Jurecic and Alan Rozenshtein sat down with Matt and Jess Miers, legal advocacy counsel at the Chamber of Progress, to debate whether ChatGPT’s output constitutes third-party content, whether companies like OpenAI should be immune for the output of their products, and why you might want to sue a chatbot in the first place.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A few weeks ago, Human Rights Watch released a report on the forced expulsion of the Chagossian people, whom the United Kingdom deported from their island homes in the Indian Ocean about 60 years ago to make way for the United States to build a military base called Diego Garcia. The report recommends reparations for the Chagossian people and a trial for individuals responsible for these crimes against humanity—the very first time the group has laid such a charge at the door of the US and UK. Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien sat down with Philippe Sands, an international human rights lawyer who served as counsel for Mauritius in its bid to reclaim sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago. Philippe is the author of several books, including his most recent, "The Last Colony: A Tale of Exile, Justice and Britain's Colonial Legacy," which is about the islands. They discussed the Chagossian people’s decades-long legal struggle to return to their ancestral home, a chance phone call from a ski lift, and the role of race and identity in the making and application of international law. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On March 2, the Biden administration released its long-awaited National Cybersecurity Strategy. The new strategy comes more than two years after President Biden took office and sets out a bold vision to achieve a more cyber-secure future by the end of the decade. Lawfare Legal Fellow Saraphin Dhanani sat down with our in-house cyber experts, Lawfare’s Senior Editor Stephanie Pell and Fellow in Tech Policy and Law Eugenia Lostri, to discuss the strategy and their latest piece published on Lawfare, titled “The Biden-Harris Administration Releases New National Cybersecurity Strategy.” Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Amichai Cohen and Yuval Shany are both Israeli legal scholars and longtime Lawfare contributors. Shany is a professor of international law at the Hebrew University Law School in Jerusalem. Cohen is a professor at Ono Academic College. They are both scholars at the Israel Democracy Institute, and together they are also co-authors of a six-part series in Lawfare about the ongoing effort by the Israeli government to alter the Israeli judicial system. It is a detailed account of a very serious reform operation in Israel, one that the authors argue is dangerous. They joined Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes to discuss the ongoing protests in Israel, the ongoing legislative efforts, and the history of the Israeli judicial system and its growing power that has led to this crisis.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For the past 20 years, Richard Haass has led the Council on Foreign Relations, building on his national security experience in government and his related work in academia and think tanks. Although his efforts have focused overwhelmingly on foreign policy, his central concern has turned to something closer to home: the decline of democratic norms in the United States. He's even written a new book about this problem and something we all can do about it, “The Bill of Obligations: The Ten Habits of Good Citizens.”David Priess and Haass discussed the State Department's Policy Planning Staff and Haass' experiences leading it, reflections on his service in the Bush 41 and Bush 43 administrations, the mission of the Council on Foreign Relations and Haass's longest-ever tenure of leading it, the Russian invasion of Ukraine and its many implications, the roles of China and India in this shifting strategic landscape, democratic decline in the United States, the ten habits that American citizens can adopt to heal our divisions and safeguard representative democracy in the U.S., and more.Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Noam Osband and Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From December 7, 2019: Wargaming has long been a staple of military strategizing, but how do we plan for the future in cyberspace, a realm where governments do not hold a monopoly on capabilities? A new report from the Atlantic Council argues that "visualizing and describing the evolution of cyber capabilities and strategic competition require envisioning multiple futures," and the report sets out to do exactly that. This week, Lawfare's Susan Hennessey sat down with John Watts, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, and JD Work, the Bren Chair for Cyber Conflict and Security at the Marine Corps University, who are authors of "Alternate Cybersecurity Futures," along with Nina Kollars, Ben Jensen, and Chris Whyte. They talked about the behind-the-scenes of strategic policy planning, the value of creativity, and what scenarios emerge when you ask cybersecurity experts to predict the future.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Lawfare Publisher David Priess wore his hat as a Senior Fellow at George Mason University's Michael V. Hayden Center for Intelligence, Policy, and International Security to host a rare live conversation on counterintelligence with leading practitioners. His guests were Mirriam-Grace MacIntyre, Executive Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC), and Alan Kohler, Assistant Director of the Counterintelligence Division at the FBI. They discussed the organization known as the NCSC, the role it plays across the U.S. Government and beyond, and how the FBI's long-running counterintelligence efforts play into it. They talked a lot about the People's Republic of China and its extensive intelligence efforts against the U.S., as well as about counterintelligence and science, outreach to the public on these issues, how Congress fits in, and more. The event was not brief, so we have edited it slightly for length without losing any significant substance.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since December, Peru has been in the midst of a protracted politico crisis. Following a failed coup in early December, President Pedro Castillo was arrested, becoming the fifth president to leave office in Peru in five years. In the midst of protests, Castillo’s deputy Dina Boluarte took power. But protests have continued in the following months, with roughly 60 people dead—mostly protestors killed by the police and the military, as the Peruvian government takes an increasingly authoritarian turn. After Castillo’s departure from office in December, Lawfare published a podcast conversation with Rodrigo Barrenechea, a 2022/23 Santo Domingo Visiting Scholar at the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University and an assistant professor at the Departamento de Ciencias Sociales of the Universidad Católica del Uruguay. With the violence and unrest continuing to unfold, Lawfare Senior Editor Quinta Jurecic asked Rodrigo back on the podcast for an update on where things stand. He explained why he thinks that Peru may no longer be fairly described as a democracy and why it’s hard to see an end to this crisis any time soon.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Matthew Olsen, the Assistant Attorney General of the National Security Division at the U.S. Department of Justice, gave yesterday a major address at the Brookings Institution. He talked about FISA Section 702, the section of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that allows U.S. intelligence authorities to collect against targets reasonably believed to be overseas when their signals pass through the United States. The provision comes up for reauthorization this year, and Olsen argues that it is imperative that Congress act to reauthorize it. This audio from the Brookings event includes an introduction from Camille Busette, the Interim Vice President for Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution; remarks from Olsen; a Q&A between Olsen and Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes; and questions from the live audience.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There was a big showdown at the D.C. Circuit last week over the Speech or Debate Clause and Representative Scott Perry and his cell phone, the latter of which was seized by the FBI in connection with the Jan. 6 investigation. Representative Perry wants it back, and he does not want anything on it used in the investigation. He went to Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and moved to quash the order for his phone. The judge said no, Perry’s legal team appealed, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit held arguments last week. To discuss it all, Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare senior editors Quinta Jurecic and Scott Anderson, and Dominic Solari, a Lawfare student contributor who wrote an oral argument preview and summary of the case.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Remember Havana Syndrome? Diplomats, spies, and other people suddenly hearing a loud noise and then having neurological symptoms, sometimes debilitating... Was it a mass panic? Was it a sonic weapon? Was it a directed energy weapon? And who was wielding it? These are the subjects of The Sound: Mystery of Havana Syndrome, a new podcast series put out by Goat Rodeo, PRX, and Project Brazen. Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with journalist and host Nicky Woolf, and producer Max Johnston of Goat Rodeo, to talk about the truth of Havana Syndrome. Was it real, or was it a fantasy? What kind of weapon could do that sort of thing, and could you build one at home? And who would want to shoot a ray gun at U.S. personnel all over the world?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Rational Security, Alan, Quinta, and Scott sat through literally hours of oral arguments to prepare to discuss all the national security developments in the news, including:“The HIMAR Anniversary.” The war in Ukraine is one year old this week. The Biden administration marked the occasion with a presidential visit to Kyiv and a finding of crimes against humanity, while Vladimir Putin celebrated by moving the Doomsday Clock a bit closer to midnight. What should we make of where the war stands one year in?“We’re Living in a Post-Algorithm World, and I’m a Post-Algorithm Girl.” So said Justice Elena Kagan (more or less), as she and the other members of the Supreme Court heard arguments in Gonzalez v. Google and Twitter v. Taamneh on terrorism liability and the scope of protections under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act—a case that some argue could break the internet. What did we learn from oral arguments? And what might the ramifications be?“Bold Dominion.” Dominion Voting Systems filed a stunning brief in its defamation lawsuit against Fox News earlier this week, which lays out in 200 detailed pages the extent to which Fox’s executives and on-air personalities knowingly amplified lies about the company’s conduct around the 2020 election. What did we learn about Fox’s culpability? And what would a Dominion win mean moving forward?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From March 18, 2021: On this episode of Arbiters of Truth, the Lawfare Podcast’s miniseries on our online information ecosystem, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic spoke with Daphne Keller, the director of the Program on Platform Regulation at Stanford's Cyber Policy Center and an expert on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the statute that shields internet platforms from civil liability for third-party content on their websites. The statute has been criticized by both Democrats and Republicans, and both President Trump and President Biden separately called for its repeal. So what should we expect in terms of potential revision of 230 during the current Congress? What does Daphne think about the various proposals on the table? And how is it that so many proposals to reform 230 would be foiled by that pesky First Amendment?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s the first anniversary of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia. To talk about this first year and what comes next, Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Alina Polyakova, president of the Center for European Policy Analysis. In a kind of tour of what's been happening in the region over the past year, they discussed what’s been going on in Ukraine, in Russia, in Eastern Europe, in Western Europe, and of course, in the United States.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in a pair of cases concerning to what extent online platforms can be held responsible for terrorist content on their services. Gonzalez v. Google focused on the scope of Section 230, which shields platforms from liability for third-party content. Twitter v. Taamneh, meanwhile, concerned whether platforms can be held liable under the Anti-Terrorism Act if members of terrorist groups use their services to recruit and spread their message. Oral arguments took a combined five hours as the justices slogged through these difficult questions about the functioning of the modern internet. Lawfare senior editors Quinta Jurecic, Scott R. Anderson, and Alan Rozenshtein, and Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes, sat down to discuss.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Special Counsel Jack Smith has issued a subpoena to former Vice President Mike Pence as part of the investigation into Trump’s role in instigating the Jan. 6 riot. But Pence has said he’ll fight the subpoena. And he’s pointed to the Speech or Debate Clause—a constitutional immunity that protects members of Congress—on the argument that he was acting as part of the legislative branch when he presided over the electoral count on January 6, 2021.Setting aside Pence’s motives for taking this approach, the merits of the legal argument are less crazy than they might sound. Lawfare senior editors Quinta Jurecic and Molly Reynolds sat down to talk through these issues with two former congressional lawyers: Eric Columbus, who recently served as Special Litigation Counsel in the House Office of General Counsel under Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Mike Stern, a former senior counsel to the House of Representatives.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chris Inglis has had an illustrious career in the defense of this country, serving as an Air Force general, deputy director of the National Security Agency, and most recently as the first National Cyber Director in the White House. Chris stepped down from his position last week, and he sat down for his first interview as a private citizen with David Kris, Lawfare contributor and former assistant attorney general for the National Security Division, and Bryan Cunningham, Lawfare contributor and executive director of the University of California, Irvine’s Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute. They talked about a wide range of cyber topics, including the newly minted National Cyber Strategy, protection of critical infrastructure, cyber insurance, competition in the international front, and more.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From April 30, 2021: When President Biden entered office, he inherited a bilateral relationship with Turkey that was strained to the limits by the growing independent streak in that country's foreign policy—and one that had been pushed in unfamiliar directions by his predecessor's direct and often unpredictable personal relationship with Turkey's longstanding president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. This past week, the Biden administration made its first major move on the U.S.-Turkey relationship by recognizing the atrocities committed against Armenians by Ottoman authorities in the early 20th century as a genocide, a move that prior presidents had avoided for fear of how Turkey might react.To discuss what these developments may mean for this key bilateral relationship, Scott R. Anderson sat down with Nicholas Danforth of the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy and Asli Aydıntaşbaş of the European Council on Foreign Relations. They discussed how Turkey views its place in the world, what this means for its alliance with the United States and how the Biden administration is likely to respond moving forward.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Along with co-editors Peter Feaver, William Inboden, and Meghan O'Sullivan, former National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley is editor of the new “Hand-Off: The Foreign Policy George W. Bush Passed to Barack Obama.” This unique and massive book contains 30 Transition Memos prepared in 2008–2009 under Hadley's direction by the outgoing George W. Bush administration’s National Security Council staff for the incoming Obama Administration—each with a postscript by these same experts critically assessing the Bush foreign policy legacy.Historians and national security junkies usually have to wait a long time for such materials to see the light of day; this consolidated content reveals much, and relatively quickly, about the various policies of the time and the extensive effort that was put into the gold-standard 2008–2009 transition.David Priess asked Hadley about his experiences with presidential transitions dating back to the 1970s; how it felt to be on the receiving end of the transition process in 2000–2001; President George W. Bush's transition mandate to him and to Chief of Staff Josh Bolten in 2008; the substantive NSC Transition Memos on the Freedom Agenda, the War on Terror, Iraq, Afghanistan, Russia, and PEPFAR; public perceptions of the national security advisor's role; how much national security advisors should interact with the media; and more.Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From April 6, 2021: Natan Sachs is a Brookings senior fellow and the head of the Brookings Center for Middle East Policy, part of the Brookings Foreign Policy program. Benjamin Wittes sat down with Natan to talk about the results of the Israeli election, which are still unclear amid a haze over the entire political system. They talked about what the dispute between the camps is about, the many different factions and what they want, and why they can't sit together easily in a government. They also talked about the fact that Israel doesn't have a budget for the second year in a row, and they discussed whether anyone will be able to prevent the fifth election in two years.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On February 14, the Brookings Institution hosted an event on the upcoming Supreme Court oral arguments in Gonzalez v. Google and Twitter v. Taamneh—two cases that could potentially reshape the internet. The Court is set to hear arguments in both cases next week, on February 21 and 22. Depending on how the justices rule, Gonzalez could result in substantial changes to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the bedrock legal protection on which the internet is built. For today’s podcast, we’re bringing you audio of that discussion. Lawfare senior editor Quinta Jurecic moderated a panel that included Hany Farid, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, with a joint appointment in electrical engineering & computer sciences and the School of Information; Daphne Keller, the director of the Program on Platform Regulation at Stanford University’s Cyber Policy Center; Lawfare senior editor Alan Rozenshtein; and Lawfare editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Earlier this month, a Pakistani man named Majid Khan started his new life in Belize after spending nearly half his previous life in U.S. detention, first at a CIA black site where he was subjected to torture and other mistreatment, and then at Guantanamo Bay. Lawfare managing editor Tyler McBrien sat down with Karen J. Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at Fordham University School of Law, and the author of several books, to discuss one of Khan's fellow inmates, Saifullah Paracha, as well Saifullah’s son Uzair. They discussed Karen's recent Lawfare article on the Parachas, the separate but intertwined systems of justice that the father and son navigated, and Guantanamo Bay's fraught past and uncertain future.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Jan. 6 committee’s final report on the insurrection is over 800 pages, including the footnotes. But there’s still new information coming out about the committee’s findings and its work.Last week, we brought you an interview with Dean Jackson, one of the staffers who worked on the Jan. 6 committee’s investigation into the role of social media in the insurrection. Today, we’re featuring a conversation with Jacob Glick, who served as investigative counsel on the committee and is currently a policy counsel at Georgetown’s Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection. His work in the Jan. 6 investigation focused on social media and far-right extremism. Lawfare senior editor Quinta Jurecic spoke with Jacob about what the investigation showed him about the forces that led to Jan. 6, how he understands the threat still posed by extremism, and what it was like interviewing Twitter whistleblowers and members of far-right groups who stormed the Capitol.You can read Jacob’s essay with Mary McCord on countering extremism here in Just Security and listen to an interview with Jacob and his Jan. 6 committee colleagues here at Tech Policy Press.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Last month's brutal murder of Tyre Nichols by Memphis police has once again sparked a national conversation about the causes of and remedies for persistent police misconduct and abuse. To explore this issue, Jack Goldsmith sat down with Joanna Schwartz, a law professor at UCLA School of Law, who is the author of a new book called, “Shielded: How the Police Became Untouchable.” The book argues that police abuse is a result of pervasive pathologies in the legal system that shield from accountability not just police officers, but also their supervisors and the local governments for which they work.Joanna and Jack discussed the many accountability gaps in the legal regime governing police abuse. Like her book, they focused on problems of achieving justice through the civil rights system, problems that include the high bars to finding a lawyer and to convincing a judge to hear the case, Fourth Amendment doctrine, qualified immunity, and the challenges of municipal liability. They also discussed the best path to reform and the prospects of reform.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since it launched in November of last year, ChatGPT has been subject to widespread attention. Cyber criminals have been quick to try to find ways to abuse the AI tool for their own purposes, from improving their phishing emails and supporting money-making schemes, to writing malware. Could ChatGPT help lower entry barriers for less skilled cyber criminals to be? To answer that question, Lawfare fellow in technology policy and law Eugenia Lostri sat down with Alexander Leslie, associate threat intelligence analyst at Recorded Future. Alexander was the lead analyst for the recent report, “I, Chatbot,” which looked at how threat actors are trying to misuse ChatGPT. They discussed who are the threat actors that can benefit from it the most, the impact this will have on the cybercrime-as-a-service business model, and how to think through mitigation strategies. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Rational Security, Alan, Quinta, and Scott were joined once again by host emeritus Benjamin Wittes to talk through the week's various freak-outs, including:“We Found the 100th Luftballon.” Last week, a Chinese spy balloon floated over the United States, triggering a national freak-out that led to the cancellation of a major high-level summit between U.S. and Chinese leaders. Was this freak-out warranted? What does it tell us about U.S.-China relations?“SotFU.” President Biden delivered his second State of the Union address last night—and it was about as contentious as expected. How did he do? And how should we feel about this most vaunted of national institutions?“ChatOMG.” Over the past several weeks, countless Americans have had the chance to hash it out with ChatGPT, a large language-model artificial intelligence that is open to the public and will either revolutionize or devastate a thousand different human tasks, depending on who you ask. Just how revolutionary is ChatGPT? And is that a good thing or a bad thing?Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From June 2, 2018: The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) plays an essential role in advising the president on how to exercise his or her authority to block foreign investments that might let the U.S.'s adversaries acquire sensitive American technology or intellectual property. A bipartisan proposal in Congress aims to expand CFIUS’s powers. On Thursday, the Center for Strategic and International Studies convened a panel of Dov Zakheim, a former Pentagon official; Ivan Schlager, a partner with Skadden Arps’ national security practice; Nova Daly, a senior public policy adviser with Wiley Rein; and CSIS Vice President James Andrew Lewis, to talk about CFIUS and how it might change under the new law.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

International law has been under significant stress in the last decade as a result of global populism, the rise of China, the war in Ukraine, and the challenges of the pandemic, climate change, and cybersecurity threats, among many others. To discuss why international law seems to be failing in important respects and what to do about it, Jack Goldsmith sat down with Paul Stephan, the John C. Jeffries, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Virginia, and author of the new book, “The World Crisis and International Law: The Knowledge Economy and the Battle for the Future.” They discussed whether international law is truly failing, and if so, how; Stephan's claim that the accelerating pace of technological change induced by the knowledge economy best explains international law’s unraveling; why the highest courts of important states are increasingly rejecting international law and the orders of international courts and tribunals; and Stephan's bottom-up prescriptions for these problems.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.