Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina sits down with Jimmy Rushton, a Kyiv-based journalist and security analyst who recently published, “ How Ukraine gained the upper hand in the drone war against Russia ,” in the Kyiv Independent. They talk about how the balance of power in the drone war seems to have shifted in Ukraine’s favor, Russia's latest missile strike on Kyiv, and what it all means for Russia’s broader strategic position in its war against Ukraine. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a La...
May 29, 2026•32 min
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Anna Bower and Eric Columbus, and his Brookings colleague Molly Reynolds, to talk through a couple of the week’s big news stories in domestic politics, including: “The Grift That Keeps On Giving.” Last week, the Justice Department announced the creation of a so-called Anti-Weaponization Fund of nearly 1.8 billion taxpayer dollars, from which purported victims of politically motivated prosecutions can apply to receive payments. The fund was cr...
May 28, 2026•1 hr 9 min
Sean Wiswesser, author of the new book, “ Tradecraft, Tactics, and Dirty Tricks: Russian Intelligence and Putin’s Secret War ,” and a former senior operations officer with the CIA, joins Lawfare ’s Justin Sherman to discuss the major Russian security organs and their training, characteristics of Russian “sticks-and-bricks” surveillance and counter-surveillance tradecraft, and the Russians’ use of coercion, kompromat , and sex (often dubbed “sexpionage”) to recruit and pressure people. They also ...
May 28, 2026•37 min
Senior Editor Michael Feinberg sits down with Sophia Yan, a senior foreign correspondent with The Telegraph, to discuss her time reporting on the Chinese government, and how it leveraged its security services to investigate her in turn. Sophia recently wrote in-depth about this experience in “ The secret Chinese surveillance programme tracking people like me ,” in The Telegraph. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You can also support Law...
May 27, 2026•48 min
On today’s episode, Lawfare Managing Editor Tyler McBrien sits down with Eve Fairbanks, a writer and journalist based in Johannesburg, South Africa, and Madeleine Schwartz, founder and editor-in-chief of The Dial, a magazine of international writing , to discuss The Dial’s forthcoming book, “How We See it: The World Looks at America in the Age of Trump” (out June 9 from The New Press) . They speak about several essays in the collection, which is made up of contributions by journalists from aroun...
May 26, 2026•53 min
In a live conversation on YouTube , Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Anna Bower, Eric Columbus, and Roger Parloff discussed the Department of Justice’s newly-announced “Anti-Weaponization Fund” which purports to “hear and redress claims of others who suffered weaponization and lawfare,” oral argument in Anthropic v. U.S. Department of War before the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and more. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare . ...
May 25, 2026•1 hr 39 min
From April 2, 2025: Atul Gawande is a surgeon and a public health expert. He's also the former head of global health at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), an agency that the Trump administration has prioritized for dismantling since its first day in office. On today's episode, Executive Editor Natalie Orpett sat down with Gawande to discuss what USAID does, the consequences of destroying it, and why public health is so important to U.S. national security. Editor's Note: This ...
May 24, 2026•58 min
From January 23, 2025: Alexis Loeb, the former Deputy Chief of the Capitol Siege Section of the Department of Justice, sits down with Lawfare Senior Editor Roger Parloff to talk about President Trump's blanket pardons and commutations for everyone her unit prosecuted. She discusses how she became involved with the cases; how they were handled by prosecutors, judges, and juries; a couple of cases she personally prosecuted; and her views on the impact of Trump's pardon proclamation. To receive ad-...
May 23, 2026•41 min
This week, the Department of Justice announced that Trump and his sons dropped their lawsuit against the IRS and Treasury in exchange for a $1.776 billion fund for Trump’s allies and blanket immunity from government suits for the Trump family. Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes talks with Senior Editor Eric Columbus about what the settlement means, where it came from, and what can be done about it. You can read much more in the piece Eric co-authored with Senior Editor Anna Bower in Lawfare...
May 22, 2026•50 min
This week, Scott sat down with co-host emeritus Benjamin Wittes and Brookings Senior Fellow Kari Heerman to talk through the week’s big news in national security, including: “With Friends Like Xi.” This past week, top U.S. officials and business CEOs traveled with President Trump to Beijing for his summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The summit had a warm air to it, with Trump going so far as to call Xi his “friend,” a far cry from his hawkish stance toward China during the campaign and hi...
May 21, 2026•1 hr 14 min
Senior Editor Michael Feinberg sits down with Daniel Bell, a professor at the University of Hong Kong, who recently wrote, “ Why Ancient Chinese Political Thought Matters: Four Dialogues on China’s Past, Present, and Future .” They discuss the ongoing influence of ancient Chinese political theory on the contemporary policies of the PRC and its domestic debates. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You can also support Lawfare by making a o...
May 21, 2026•52 min
Loren Voss, Senior Editor at Lawfare , sits down with Jeffrey Stern to discuss his new book " The Warhead: The Quest to Build the Perfect Weapon in the Age of Modern Warfare ." They talk about the development of the Paveway bomb and the importance of precision weapons to modern warfare. Stern grapples with their complicated effects on warfare, both adding precision to warfare that can reduce civilian casualties but also distancing the human element from killing, allowing force to be used more fr...
May 20, 2026•40 min
Senior Editor Michael Feinberg sits down with Antonia Senior, whose new book on the history of the Cambridge spy ring, “ Stalin's Apostles: The Cambridge Five and the Making of the Soviet Empire ,” comes out in the United States at end of this month. They talk about the history of the spy ring, how they were recruited, how they were unmasked, and their lasting effect on the culture of espionage. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You can...
May 19, 2026•53 min
In a live conversation on YouTube , Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Anna Bower, Eric Columbus, and Roger Parloff to discuss Judge Boulee denying Fulton County’s motion for the return of the 2020 election ballots seized by the FBI, a judge ordering the National Endowment for Humanities to rescind DOGE-backed cancellation of grants, oral argument in Mark Kelly v. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and more. You can find information on legal challenges t...
May 18, 2026•1 hr 43 min
From May 15, 2025: For today's episode, Lawfare Foreign Policy Editor Daniel Byman talked with Evan Braden Montgomery and Toshi Yoshihara, both Senior Fellows at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, to discuss their recent Lawfare article, " Beijing's Changing Invasion Calculus: How China Might Put Taiwan in its Crosshairs ." Together they discuss how China might use a blockade, subversion, and nuclear threats to intimidate Taiwan, the United States, and key regional states like J...
May 17, 2026•38 min
From January 10, 2023: District Attorney of Fulton County Fani Willis has completed her special grand jury investigation of election tampering in 2020. The special purpose grand jury has completed its report and has been dissolved, and the supervising judge yesterday scheduled a hearing for January 24 to decide whether to make the report public. What will happen next? Will there be indictments? Are they going to wait until after the report comes out, or should we expect them imminently? Should w...
May 16, 2026•59 min
Ukraine Fellow Anastasiia Lapatina sits down with Danylo Mokryk, a war crimes investigator at the Kyiv Independent and the author of a YouTube blog about domestic Ukrainian Politics, to talk about the latest corruption saga engulfing the Ukrainian government—and why, despite so many arrows pointing toward Zelensky personally, no one is calling for his removal. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . You can also support Lawfare by making a on...
May 15, 2026•46 min
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Senior Editor Michael Feinberg and Foreign Policy Editor Dana Stuster for a little chat with the guys about the week’s big national security news stories, including: “Minding Your Bs and Ts.” President Trump arrived in China this week alongside top U.S. officials and business executives for a much-anticipated summit with President Xi Jinping. U.S. diplomats hope the summit will revolve around the “five Bs”—meaning U.S. beef, soybeans, Boeing ...
May 14, 2026•1 hr 13 min
On today’s episode, Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sits down with Rep. Sara Jacobs, who represents California’s 51st congressional district. As a member of the House armed services and foreign affairs committees, Rep. Jacobs has taken a lead role on an array of foreign affairs-related legislation. Before being elected to Congress, she worked for the U.S. Department of State and the United Nations. Together, Scott and Rep. Jacobs discuss her and her colleagues’ efforts to oppose the Iran...
May 14, 2026•40 min
For today's episode, Lawfare Foreign Policy Editor Daniel Byman sits down with Holly Berkley Fletcher, former CIA Africa analyst, and Alexander Palmer, fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, to discuss the growth of terrorism and instability in East and West Africa, the fragility of regional governments, and how the United States and other outside powers are shaping the region. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare . Yo...
May 13, 2026•50 min
Candace Rondeaux, the founder and principal of Frontline Atlas, an independent geopolitical risk intelligence hub; a professor with the Future Security Initiative at Arizona State University; and a senior fellow in global security at New America joins Lawfare ’s Justin Sherman to discuss the latest geopolitics, operations, and state of Russian private military companies (PMCs). They discuss the current state of Russia’s Wagner Group and other Russian PMCs, their roles in recruitment of people to...
May 12, 2026•53 min
In February, the Trump administration launched Operation Epic Fury in Iran—without congressional approval. The War Powers Resolution is supposed to constrain the president's ability to wage war. But is it? On today's podcast, Lawfare Executive Editor Natalie Orpett talks with Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson about what that law says, whether it's affecting the administration's conduct, and how—or if—it can be enforced. You can read more of Scott's analysis in Lawfare here: https://www.lawfaremedi...
May 11, 2026•59 min
From July 17, 2023: The only thing more impressive than the performance of generative AI systems like GPT-4 and Stable Diffusion is the sheer volume of training data that went into these systems. GPT was reportedly trained on, essentially, the entire Internet, while Stable Diffusion and other image-generation models rely on hundred of millions if not billions of existing pieces of artwork. Of course, much of this content is copyrighted, and the authors and artists whose work is being used to tra...
May 10, 2026•38 min
From January 9, 2025: Jack Goldsmith sits down with Orin Kerr, a Professor at Stanford Law School, to discuss his new book , “The Digital Fourth Amendment: Privacy and Policing in Our Online World.” They talk about how Kerr became interested in these issues, the history and physicality assumptions of the Fourth Amendment, and how and why the digital world is different. They also discuss how the courts are interpreting the Fourth Amendment in a digital age, as well as Kerr’s Equilibrium-Adjustmen...
May 09, 2026•56 min
On May 7, Lawfare Senior Editor Kate Klonick sat down for a live discussion on Substack with Steve Vladeck, a professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center, to discuss the impact of the New York Times’ “shadow papers” story, the continued omnipresence of the shadow docket, and the courts v. Court in this administration. 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://giv...
May 08, 2026•45 min
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Molly Roberts, Roger Parloff, and Tyler McBrien to talk through the week’s big national security news stories, including: “Jim Spells Seashells By the Seashore.” Former FBI Director James Comey was indicted again this past week, this time for allegedly threatening the life of the president by spelling “8647” in shells at the beach and posting an image on social media. It is a ludicrous argument. So what does it tell us that Acting Attorney Ge...
May 07, 2026•1 hr 22 min
On today’s podcast, Lawfare Associate Editor for Communications Anna Hickey talks to Nicholas Enrich, former acting assistant administrator of Global Health at USAID, about his book, “ Into the Wood Chipper: A Whistleblower's Account of How the Trump Administration Shredded USAID .” Enrich details the agency's dismantling during the early months of the Trump administration and whether those doing the dismantling understood the consequences of their actions. He also discusses the impact on global...
May 07, 2026•46 min
Patrick Radden Keefe, a staff writer at the New Yorker and the author of “ Say Nothing ” and “ Empire of Pain ,” sits down with Lawfare Associate Editor Peter Beck to discuss his most recent book, “ London Falling .” The two talk about Radden Keefe’s investigation of a London teenager’s fatal plunge into the Thames, the United Kingdom’s acquiescence to foreign influence, and his process in writing about the book. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com...
May 06, 2026•36 min
Lawfare Senior Editor Kate Klonick speaks with former Deputy Solicitor General Michael Dreeben ; lecturer in law at Stanford, Richard Salgado ; and attorney Adam Unikowsky , to discuss the geofencing Fourth Amendment case that was heard Monday, April 27 in the Supreme Court, Chatrie v. United States. They discuss the background of the case with their unique perspectives, starting with Unikowsky's framing of the case for his client, Chatrie, and his thoughts on the arguments he made in his defens...
May 05, 2026•1 hr 3 min
In a live conversation on YouTube , Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Anna Bower, Molly Roberts, and Roger Parloff and Lawfare Contributing Editor Nicholas Bednar to discuss the second indictment of former FBI Director James Comey, a judge finding that he has jurisdiction over Maureen Comey’s litigation challenging the Justice Department’s firing of her last her, oral argument at the Supreme Court over the cancellation of TPS, and more. You can find inf...
May 04, 2026•1 hr 39 min
