Share
The Lawfare Podcast
Rational Security: The “Stop Cap” Edition
•
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Kate Klonick, Molly Roberts, and Troy Edwards to talk through the week’s big national security news stories, including:
- “MisAnthropic.” On Monday, Anthropic filed a civil complaint in the Northern District of California and a petition for hearing at the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit over the Department of Defense’s designation of the frontier artificial intelligence company as a “supply chain risk.” The litigation capped off weeks of building tensions between Anthropic and Pentagon officials over the firm’s two ethical red lines for the Defense Department and its use of its AI model, Claude, specifically around widespread surveillance of Americans and the use of AI and autonomous weapons. What exactly are the Pentagon’s grounds for designating Anthropic as a supply chain risk, and how does Anthropic argue that doing so is inconsistent with the law? And what might the implications be for the AI industry as a whole?
- “The Mashhadian Candidate.” Fears that Iran would respond to the ongoing Israeli-U.S. military campaign through overseas terrorism have come to a head this week, as reports emerged that U.S. intelligence had detected an encrypted message being transmitted from Iran that may serve as “an operational trigger” for assets sitting outside of the country. What do we know about Iran’s involvement in past clandestine operations, including terrorism? And what does it mean that this is all happening at a moment when the Justice Department and FBI have lost so many of their experienced national security personnel?
- “Maricopa-calypse Now.” Federal investigators have ramped up several inquiries that appear to be aimed at longstanding—and, thus far, unsubstantiated—allegations of fraud in the 2020 election that are particularly popular with President Trump and his closest supporters. Last month, FBI agents executed a search warrant on Fulton County’s election office and confiscated ballots and voting equipment used in 2020. Last week, the FBI reportedly subpoenaed records from a conservative Arizona legislator over the state senate’s audit of the 2020 election results in Maricopa County. And days later, the Department of Homeland Security’s Homeland Security Investigations office (or HSI) requested records from Arizona state officials regarding their own investigations into alleged 2020 malfeasance. What should we make of these developments? And at what point should we be concerned about the federal government's engagement in these sorts of matters in advance of the upcoming 2026 midterms?
This week’s object lessons are all-consuming. Kate is celebrating online legal analysis by drinking from her Balkinization mug. Troy is lamenting yet another slate of firings at the FBI by drinking from his EX FED mug. Scott, finding himself with unexpected free time at Union Station, devoured Barbara Tuchman’s “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century.” And Molly introduces us to the texturally triggering cherimoya.
To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.
More episodes
View all episodes
Lawfare Archive: Hunter Marston on the South China Sea
34:17|From October 25, 2024: Hunter Marston, PhD candidate at the Australian National University and Southeast Asia Associate at 9DashLine, joins Kevin Frazier, Assistant Professor at St. Thomas University College of Law and a Tarbell Fellow at Lawfare, to explore the economic and geopolitical significance of the South China Sea. Hunter leans on his extensive knowledge of Southeast Asian politics and history to paint a comprehensive picture of why the next Administration should pay close attention to this geographical hotbed of political tension.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Archive: The New January 6 Reports
58:38|From January 6, 2025: On today’s podcast, Lawfare Senior Editor and Brookings Senior Fellow Molly Reynolds is joined by Quinta Jurecic, a Fellow at Brookings and Senior Editor at Lawfare, and Ryan Reilly, Justice Reporter at NBC News, to discuss a long-awaited report on Jan. 6 from the Department of Justice’s Inspector General, as well as a new report from House Republicans focusing on the pipe bombs planted outside the Democratic and Republican National Committees as part of the violence that day. They explore what the reports do—and do not—cover, how they fit in with other investigative work on the insurrection, and what the overall landscape of accountability looks like on the precipice of President Trump’s return to office.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Daily: The Justice Department Throws Out the Proud Boys and Oath Keeper Cases
01:01:05|The Justice Department has moved the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to drop the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys seditious conspiracy cases, the last remaining criminal matters arising from the Jan. 6 insurrection. Lawfare’s editor in chief, Benjamin Wittes, sits down with four contributors who had intimate involvement with the cases to discuss the decision: Senior Editor Roger Parloff, who covered both trials; Senior Editor Michael Feinberg, who investigated both the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers; Public Service Fellow Troy Edwards, who prosecuted the Oath Keepers case; and James Pearce of Washington Litigation Group, who worked on the prosecution as well. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Daily: Crypto, Corruption, and Cons, with Ben McKenzie
57:06|Ben McKenzie, co-author of “Easy Money: Cryptocurrency, Casino Capitalism, and the Golden Age of Fraud,” and writer and director of the new documentary, “Everyone Is Lying to You for Money,” sits down with Lawfare Senior Editor Michael Feinberg about his years-long deep dive into the cryptocurrency industry and why his research makes him skeptical of its literal and figurative value.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Daily: Frank Dikötter on the Early Years of Chinese Communism
55:27|Lawfare Senior Editor Michael Feinberg and historian Frank Dikötter, the author of “Red Dawn Over China: How Communism Conquered a Quarter of Humanity,” discuss the early years of the Chinese communist movement, the American reaction to its successes, and how our current understanding of the era greatly differs from our previous assumptions.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Daily: Sam Altman with Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz
49:55|Senior Editor Kate Klonick interviews reporters Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz on their recent article in the New Yorker, titled “Sam Altman May Control Our Future—Can He Be Trusted?” In their 16,000-word piece, Farrow and Marantz create a cohesive narrative with receipts around Sam Altman, the products he's building at OpenAI, and how he's selling them not just to investors and the public, but also to regulators and world leaders.Klonick unpacks three key areas that are discussed in the piece: potential concerns of fraud, ongoing trust and safety and alignment issues at OpenAI, and the national security concerns that the article exposes in the "country plan" and Altman's entanglements in the Gulf. The discussion ends with a basic question: Are any of these legal issues enough to stop or correct the course of OpenAI, with its estimated $1T IPO in the coming weeks?To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Daily: The Trials of the Trump Administration, April 10
01:31:54|In a live conversation on YouTube, Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Molly Roberts, Eric Columbus, and Roger Parloff to discuss Judge Friedman rejecting the Defense Department’s revised press rules, the D.C. Circuit denying Anthropic’s petition for a stay pending review of the enforcement of its supply chain designation, Judge Sorokin rejecting the Justice Department’s attempt to obtain Massachusetts voter records, and more.You can find information on legal challenges to Trump administration actions here. And check out Lawfare’s new homepage on the litigation, new Bluesky account, and new WITOAD merch.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Archive: Aram Gavoor on the Biden Administration’s AI National Security Memo
45:46|From October 28, 2024: Aram Gavoor, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at GW Law, joins Kevin Frazier, Senior Research Fellow in the Constitutional Studies Program at the University of Texas at Austin and a Tarbell Fellow at Lawfare, to summarize and analyze the first-ever national security memo on AI. The two also discuss what this memo means for AI policy going forward, given the impending election.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.Lawfare Archive: Election Anxieties and the U.S. Postal Service with Kevin Kosar and Anne Joseph O’Connell
54:31|From September 1, 2020: On August 13, President Trump said in a news interview that he opposed supplemental funding for the United States Postal Service because such funding is needed for the delivery of universal mail-in ballots for the 2020 election. His comments sparked panic about whether the Trump administration is slowing Postal Service delivery in order to sway the election. Images of blue mailboxes being removed and anecdotes about slow mail delivery added fuel to the fire. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy was called to testify before Senate and House oversight committees. Lawsuits were filed by a host of state attorneys general.So what’s really going on here? Is this election interference, the implementation of legitimate policies or something else? Margaret Taylor sat down with Kevin Kosar of the American Enterprise Institute and Anne Joseph O’Connell of Stanford Law School to sort through the facts, the policy changes, the investigations and the lawsuits—and what it all means for the 2020 election.To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute.