Lawfare Senior Editor Anna Bower has been on a quest. She wants to identify the administrator of DOGE. It's partly a comedic bit. And her lengthy article on the subject on Lawfare last week is laugh-out-loud funny. But it's also deadly serious. She came on the Lawfare Podcast to discuss the serious questions behind WITAOD with Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You can also support Lawfare by making a one...
Jun 06, 2025•52 min
Today, it’s Episode Five of Escalation , our latest narrative series co-hosted by Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien and Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina. Throughout the show, Nastya and Tyler trace the history of U.S.-Ukrainian relations from the time of Ukrainian independence through the present. You can listen to Escalation in its entirety, as well as our other narrative series, on our Lawfare Presents channel , wherever you get your podcasts. In Episode Five, Ukraine’s Russia-backed pre...
Jun 05, 2025•52 min
It’s been a big week in Ukrainian-Russian relations. There were surprise attacks, an amassing of troops, the blowing up of bridges, and peace talks in Istanbul that didn’t really go anywhere. To talk through all of this and more, Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare ’s Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina and Legal Fellow Mykhailo Soldatenko. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You can also support Lawfare by making...
Jun 05, 2025•58 min
This week, Scott sat down with Lawfare ’s Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina and Contributing Editors Eric Ciaramella and Alex Zerden to talk through the week’s big national security and foreign policy news, including: “The Road to Damascus.” Over the past two weeks, the Trump administration has done an extraordinary about-face on U.S. policy towards Syria, installing almost universal exceptions to most existing sanctions programs and promising to end others. European and other allies seem poise...
Jun 04, 2025•1 hr 10 min
Political scientists who study democratic backsliding—the slow erosion of a country’s institutions—have raised alarms about the state of democracy in the United States under the second Trump administration. At the same time, the administration has embraced technology—particularly AI—as a tool for implementing many of its policies, from immigration enforcement to slashing government functions and staffing . And the ties between Washington, D.C. and Silicon Valley appear tighter than ever, with El...
Jun 04, 2025•1 hr 26 min
Today, it’s Episode Four of Escalation , our latest narrative series co-hosted by Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien and Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina. Throughout the show, Nastya and Tyler trace the history of U.S.-Ukrainian relations from the time of Ukrainian independence through the present. You can listen to Escalation in its entirety, as well as our other narrative series, on our Lawfare Presents channel , wherever you get your podcasts. Episode Four explores the interconnected sto...
Jun 03, 2025•41 min
For today’s episode, Lawfare General Counsel and Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sat down with Contributing Editor and leading sanctions expert Peter Harrell to talk over the not one but two judicial rulings that enjoined President Trump's tariffs last week. They discussed the similarities and differences between the two rulings, what seems likely to happen on appeal, and what it all might mean for the other, more well-established uses the executive branch makes of the 1977 International Emergen...
Jun 03, 2025•1 hr
In a live conversation on May 30, Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Anna Bower, Scott Anderson, and Roger Parloff to discuss legal challenges against President Trump’s executive actions, including two court rulings finding President Trump’s IEEPA tariffs to be unlawful, the government’s appeal of those rulings, the Supreme Court allowing Trump to end humanitarian status for 500,000 migrants, updates in CREW’s Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against D...
Jun 02, 2025•1 hr 28 min
From May 21, 2024: Across the country, state lawmakers are joining the effort to address the perceived national security threat from China by passing a number of measures attempting to curb Chinese influences in their states. One such effort in Florida prevents Chinese citizens from owning property in the state. Lawfare ’s Associate Editor Hyemin Han spoke with Matthew Erie, Associate Professor at the University of Oxford, about what makes the Florida law and the ongoing litigation challenging i...
Jun 01, 2025•41 min
From May 23, 2024: For today’s episode, Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sat down with Chimène Keitner, a Professor of Law at UC Davis School of Law and former Counselor on International Law at the U.S. Department of State, to discuss the recent applications for arrest warrants filed by the prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC), accusing several senior Hamas leaders as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant of crimes against ...
May 31, 2025•53 min
Josh Batson, a research scientist at Anthropic, joins Kevin Frazier, AI Innovation and Law Fellow at the Texas Law and Senior Editor at Lawfare , to break down two research papers—“ Mapping the Mind of a Large Language Model ” and “ Tracing the thoughts of a large language model ”—that uncovered some important insights about how advanced generative AI models work. The two discuss those findings as well as the broader significance of interpretability and explainability research. To receive ad-fre...
May 30, 2025•41 min
Today, it’s Episode 3 of Escalation , our latest narrative series co-hosted by Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien and Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina. Throughout the show, Nastya and Tyler trace the history of U.S.-Ukrainian relations from the time of Ukrainian independence through the present. You can listen to Escalation in its entirety, as well as our other narrative series, on our Lawfare Presents channel , wherever you get your podcasts. Episode 3 picks up the story in the late 90s, a...
May 29, 2025•40 min
Lawfare ’s Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina sits down with Minna Ålander, an Associate Fellow at the Chatham House Europe Programme, to discuss Russia's buildup of military infrastructure along its borders with NATO member countries, particularly along the Finnish border, and what European countries are doing to prepare for a potential clash with Russia. They also talk through Finland’s history with Russia and its security capabilities, especially in light of Russia’s actions in Ukraine, the i...
May 29, 2025•37 min
This week, Scott sat down with the AI-oriented Lawfare Senior Editors Alan Rozenshtein and Kevin Frazier to talk through the week’s top AI-focused news stories, including: “Oh Sure, Now He’s Into Free Trade.” President Trump has repealed the Biden administration’s rule setting strict limits on the diffusion of high-end AI technology, opening the door to the global transfer of the technologies powering U.S. AI development, including advanced chipsets. And we’re already seeing results of that poli...
May 28, 2025•1 hr 24 min
It’s been nearly one year since Donald Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts in Manhattan criminal court. Lawfare Senior Editor Anna Bower sits down with New York Times reporter Jonah Bromwich to talk about Jonah’s new book on the subject, “ Dragon on Centre Street ,” take a look back at the trial, consider its legacy, and discuss what comes next. 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 dona...
May 28, 2025•53 min
In April, we ran Episode One of our narrative podcast series Escalation on this feed. On Tuesday and Thursday afternoons for the next few weeks, we’ll be posting the rest of the series, starting today with Episode Two. Escalation is a multi-part narrative podcast co-hosted by Lawfare ’s Managing Director Tyler McBrien and Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina, covering the history of U.S.-Ukrainian relations from the time of Ukrainian independence through the present. You can subscribe to the whole...
May 27, 2025•42 min
John Keller, now a partner at Walden, Macht & Haran, channeled his experience as the former Chief of the Public Integrity Section at the Department of Justice to discuss three recent developments with James Pearce, Lawfare Legal Fellow. They discussed proposed changes to the Public Integrity Section that could hamper the Justice Department’s ability to investigate and prosecute corruption matters in a fair and impartial matter. Keller weighed in on whether the Justice Department has a vi...
May 27, 2025•1 hr 18 min
From May 3, 2024: Over the past several years, governors around the country from both political parties have used their respective National Guards for an increasingly unconventional array of domestic missions, ranging from teaching in public schools to regulating immigration at the southern border. To discuss how this trend may impact the National Guard—and our broader democracy, particularly in this pivotal election year— Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson recently sat down with a panel of...
May 26, 2025•1 hr 22 min
From December 4, 2023: Is the Fourth Amendment doing any work anymore? In a forthcoming article entitled “Government Purchases of Private Data,” Matthew Tokson, a professor at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law, details how, in recent years, federal and state agencies have begun to purchase location information and other consumer data, as government attorneys have mostly concluded that purchasing data is a valid way to bypass Fourth Amendment restrictions. Lawfare Senior Editor S...
May 25, 2025•34 min
In a live conversation on May 22, Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Quinta Jurecic and Roger Parloff and Lawfare Legal Fellow James Pearce to discuss legal challenges against President Trump’s executive actions, including the a court hearing over the attempted deportation of immigrants to South Sudan, the arrest of Democratic Representative LaMonica McIver, the Supreme Court opinion allowing President Trump to remove members of independent agencies, and...
May 24, 2025•1 hr 36 min
Global Cyber Alliance ’s President and CEO Phil Reitinger and Chief Business Officer Komal Bazaz Smith discuss with Justin Sherman critical cybersecurity issues facing core internet infrastructure, including the role of small, often under-appreciated, and frequently underfunded nonprofits in keeping the internet secure and functioning. They talk about their organization’s Common Good Cyber project ( video here ) to address gaps, detail how better data could help inform internet security efforts,...
May 23, 2025•43 min
This week, Scott sat down with a particularly baritone cast of Lawfare colleagues—co-host emeritus Benjamin Wittes, Foreign Policy Editor Dana Stuster, and Senior Editor (aka Legal Correspondent) Roger Parloff—to discuss the week’s biggest national security news stories, including: “Let’s Sheikh On It.” President Trump completed a surprisingly historic trip to the Persian Gulf last week, which began with the type of fanfare that Trump loves and only Saudi Arabia can provide and ended with the co...
May 22, 2025•1 hr 14 min
Page Hedley, Senior Advisor at Forecasting Research Institute and co-author of the Not for Private Gain letter urging state attorneys general to stop OpenAI’s planned restructuring, and Gad Weiss, the Wagner Fellow in Law & Business at NYU Law, join Kevin Frazier, AI Innovation and Law Fellow at Texas Law and Senior Editor at Lawfare , and Alan Rozenshtein, Associate Professor at Minnesota Law and Senior Editor at Lawfare , to analyze news of OpenAI once again modifying its corporate governa...
May 22, 2025•47 min
Despite the frenzy of U.S.-led diplomacy around reaching a ceasefire in Russia’s war against Ukraine, the front line has been far from quiet. In fact, the war is now deadlier than ever before. To unpack the recent front line developments, Lawfare ’s Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina talks with Francis Farrell, a reporter at the Kyiv Independent who covers military and security dynamics in Ukraine. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You ...
May 21, 2025•55 min
El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele has made a lot of headlines recently in the United States for his partnership with the Trump administration. Bukele has helped enable President Trump’s scheme to remove supposed Venezuelan gang members from the U.S. under the Alien Enemies Act, housing these detainees in the notorious CECOT prison. In court, the Justice Department has claimed it has no ability to request that Bukele return these detainees to the United States, even after Bukele posed for phot...
May 20, 2025•51 min
In a live conversation on May 16, Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Anna Bower, Quinta Jurecic, and Roger Parloff and Lawfare Legal Fellow James Pearce to discuss legal challenges against President Trump’s executive actions, including the Friday hearing in the Abrego Garcia litigation, the Supreme Court’s ruling in an Alien Enemies Act case, oral arguments at the Supreme Court over President Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order, and so much mo...
May 19, 2025•1 hr 33 min
From September 26, 2023: On August 21, the Human Rights Watch released a report detailing systematic abuses of Ethiopian migrants and asylum seekers at the Saudi Arabia-Yemen border. Researchers interviewed dozens of Ethiopian migrants and asylum seekers and found that Saudi border guards had used explosive weapons on them and shot migrants at close range. Lawfare ’s Associate Editor of Communications Anna Hickey sat down with Joey Shea, a researcher in the Middle East and North Africa Division ...
May 18, 2025•28 min
From January 4, 2022: Government secrecy is pervasive when it comes to national security and foreign affairs, and it’s becoming more and more common for state and even local governments to invoke government secrecy rationales that in the past, only the president of the United States and the national intelligence community were able to claim. While some of the secrecy is no doubt necessary to ensure that police investigations aren't compromised and state and local officials are getting candid adv...
May 17, 2025•39 min
For today’s episode, Lawfare General Counsel and Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sat down with Contributing Editor Joel Braunold, the Managing Director of the S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace , for the latest in their series of podcast conversations delving into the latest developments relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and related regional issues. This time, they discussed the state of the Gaza conflict, what Trump’s recent trip to the Middle East says about his relation...
May 16, 2025•1 hr 10 min
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Natalie Orpett, Tyler McBrien, and Daniel Byman to talk through the week’s big national security news, including: “Borderline Behavior.” A major flare-up over the disputed region of Kashmir took place this past week, leading to a major exchange of hostilities between the nuclear powers of India and Pakistan before they agreed to a U.S.-brokered ceasefire—one that is mostly holding, despite alleged violations on both sides. How durable a resol...
May 15, 2025•1 hr 17 min
