The Lawfare Podcast

Our constitutional system involves the written document, plus two and a half centuries of judicial decisions interpreting it. But these two things only scratch the surface. It also involves our constitutional norms, the unwritten rules that govern how actors in our political system behave. For decades, commentators have observed the steady erosion of many of these norms, and in the four years of the Trump administration, the trickle of norm violations became a torrent. As a response, many in academia, the media and politics have called for Congress to pass legislation that would codify what had previously been unwritten norms of behavior, from requiring that presidential candidates disclose their tax returns to limiting the president's pardon power. In a forthcoming article in the Georgetown Law Journal, Jonathan Gould, assistant professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, analyzes many of these proposals and points out the potential unintended consequences of trying to commit unwritten norms to legislative language. Alan Rozenshtein spoke with Jonathan about the importance and erosion of constitutional norms, especially within the executive branch, and how best to repair them.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Benjamin Wittes sat down on Lawfare Live with Seamus Hughes, the deputy director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, and Alan Rozenshtein, a Lawfare senior editor and professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, to talk about the group of cases that have been filed in connection with the January 6 riot and insurrection. They talked about the database that Hughes is building and maintaining of cases, defendants and charges filed in connection with January 6; the pattern of charges; what the picture looks like so far; if it is likely to get closer to the president and his inner circle and if it will result in a series of seditious conspiracy charges.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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.

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.

David Kris sat down with David Robarge, the chief historian at the Central Intelligence Agency, to discuss covert action. All together, around 50 covert actions have been declassified over the years, and Kris and Robarge discuss several of them, involving the Middle East, Western Europe, Africa and Central America. They also talked about the legal and policy rules governing covert action, the process by which covert action is reviewed and approved and the famous "Washington Post test."Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dmitri Alperovitch is the executive chairman of Silverado Policy Accelerator, and he's the co-founder and former chief technology officer at CrowdStrike. With Ian Ward, he is the author of the recent article on Lawfare, entitled, "How Should the U.S. Respond to the SolarWinds and Microsoft Exchange Hacks?" Benjamin Wittes sat down with him to discuss the article and the hacks. They talked about how they were similar to one another and how they were different, why the SolarWinds hack has received so much more attention than the much more damaging Microsoft Exchange hack, and whether the U.S. should come down hard on Russia for its activities or if it go easy on the Russians.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Alex Vindman sat down with retired Admiral James Stavridis and Elliot Ackerman, the authors of "2034: A Novel of the Next World War." Admiral Stavridis spent more than 30 years in the U.S. Navy, rising to the rank of four-star admiral and who served as the Supreme Allied Commander at NATO. Elliot Ackerman is the author of several novels, including "Dark at the Crossing," which was a finalist for the National Book Award, and most recently, "Waiting for Eden." They discussed the objective for writing a novel on the next world war, the lessons the novel offers national security professionals and policymakers, and key points in the backstory that precipitated the march to this fictional but highly realistic portrayal of the next world war.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

President Joe Biden has conducted military strikes in Syria, has articulated legal theories under which the series of strikes were proper and has temporarily reined in the use of drone strikes. To talk about Biden and war powers, Benjamin Wittes sat down with John Bellinger, who served as the legal adviser at the State Department and the legal adviser for the National Security Council in the Bush administration; Lawfare senior editor Scott Anderson, who worked in the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser, as well as in the Iraqi embassy; and Rebecca Ingber, who also worked in the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser and is currently a professor at Cardozo Law School. They talked about how the Biden administration justified the strikes in Syria, the reports it has not yet given on its legal and policy framework for counterterrorism, whether this is the year that AUMF reform might finally happen and which authorizations to use military force might finally see reform.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this episode of Arbiters of Truth, the Lawfare Podcast’s miniseries on disinformation and misinformation, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic spoke with Genevieve Lakier, an assistant professor at the University of Chicago Law School and First Amendment expert. It’s basically impossible to have a conversation about content moderation without someone crying, “First Amendment!” at some point. But the cultural conception of the First Amendment doesn’t always match the legal conception. Evelyn and Quinta spoke with Genevieve about what First Amendment doctrine actually says, how its history might be quite different from what you think and what the dynamism of the doctrine over time—and the current composition of the Supreme Court—might suggest about the First Amendment’s possible futures for grappling with the internet.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Wesley Morgan is a former military affairs reporter at Politico and the author of the new book, "The Hardest Place: The American Military Adrift in Afghanistan's Pech Valley." Bryce Klehm sat down with Wesley to talk about the evolution of the war in Afghanistan, from the United States's early hunt for Osama bin Laden, to the increased use of drone strikes during the Obama and Trump administrations. They also discussed the current state of the war in Afghanistan, including the fight against the Islamic State's Afghanistan affiliate.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.