The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
<p>The Lawfare Podcast features discussions with experts, policymakers, and opinion leaders at the nexus of national security, law, and policy. On issues from foreign policy, homeland security, intelligence, and cybersecurity to governance and law, we have doubled down on seriousness at a time when others are running away from it. Visit us at www.lawfaremedia.org.</p><p>Support this show <a target="_blank" rel="payment" href="http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare">http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare</a>.</p><hr><p style='color:grey; font-size:0.75em;'> Hosted on Acast. See <a style='color:grey;' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer' href='https://acast.com/privacy'>acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.</p>
Recent Episodes
20 episodesLawfare Daily: Crypto, Corruption, and Cons, with Ben McKenzie
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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Frank Dikötter on the Early Years of Chinese Communism
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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Sam Altman with Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz
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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: The Trials of the Trump Administration, April 10
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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Archive: Aram Gavoor on the Biden Administration’s AI National Security Memo
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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Archive: Election Anxieties and the U.S. Postal Service with Kevin Kosar and Anne Joseph O’Connell
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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Scaling Laws: How to Use, Govern, and Lead on AI? Rep. Begich Points the Path Forward
Representative Nick Begich, Alaska's at-large member of Congress, joins Kevin Frazier, Director of the AI Innovation and Law Program at the University of Texas School of Law and a Senior Fellow at the Abundance Institute, to discuss the current state of AI policy on the Hill. As one of the few members of Congress with a background in tech, Rep. Begich offers a unique perspective on this evolving regulatory question. The two also assess how Alaska may be a leader in developing AI infrastructure. Finally, Rep. Begich shares how he and his staff leverage AI to improve their own operations.Find Scaling Laws on the Lawfare website, and subscribe to never miss an episode.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Rational Security: The “Deeply Iran-ic” Edition
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Daniel Byman, Tyler McBrien, and Natalie Orpett to talk through aspects of the week’s biggest Iran-focused news stories, including:“Situational Iran-y.” The world came into Tuesday evening fearing a major escalation in the ongoing U.S. and Israeli conflict with Iran. But instead, President Trump made a last-minute choice to accept a two-week ceasefire, conditional on the opening of the Strait of Hormuz—a condition that Iran indicated it was prepared to meet, kind of, so long as “open” means coordinating with its military forces (and paying) for safe transit. Is this the beginning of the end of the Iran conflict? And what does the shape of the ceasefire tell us about the conflict’s likely regional implications moving forward?“Verbal Iran-y.” Tuesday’s breakthrough ceasefire agreement came after days of increasingly outlandish rhetoric by President Trump, including a threat earlier that day that “a whole civilization will die tonight” if his conditions were not met. What role did Trump’s threats play in the outcome? And what might the broader ramifications might be of the U.S. president issuing threats that would amount to war crimes (if not genocide) if actually followed up on?“Dramatic Iran-y.” While Trump’s rhetoric was undoubtedly intended to communicate strength, it came from a place of increasing weakness. U.S. military operations in Iran were weeks away from a major statutory barrier, and efforts to secure needed supplemental funding are facing headwinds in Congress. Perhaps more importantly, the conflict has proven widely unpopular and devastating for the U.S. and broader global economy—two factors that weigh heavily on Trump and his congressional allies in an election year. What will this shift in the Iran conflict mean for Trump’s political future? Not to mention the legal and institutional arrangements that have allowed him to pursue so unorthodox a foreign policy in recent months?In object lessons, Dan is not playing games when simulating the 1960 presidential election. Natalie is delighting in another kind of history with the masterful writing in Claire Messud’s “This Strange Eventful History.” Scott is revisiting a 2002 Donald Trump review of “Citizen Kane” that has a somewhat surprising ending. And Tyler is recommending that you watch as much Artemis II content as humanly possible.Note: We’re taking a little break next week, but keep an eye out for our next episode on April 23!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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Katherine Pompilio on Tracking Government Non-Compliance in Habeas Corpus Cases
What does it look like when the government violates court orders in more than 350 separate immigration habeas cases?On today’s episode, Lawfare Senior Editor Molly Roberts sits down with Lawfare Associate Editor Katherine Pompilio to discuss Lawfare’s new interactive tracker, which documents what is known about instances in which the Trump administration has failed to comply with federal court orders in immigration habeas corpus proceedings.The two discuss why Lawfare built this tracker and why the project matters beyond any individual case, what the dataset reveals about a broader pattern of government non-compliance, the absence of institutional record-keeping, holding the government accountable, and more.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Yaqiu Wang on Surveillance, Censorship, and Emerging Technologies in the PRC
Lawfare Senior Editor Michael Feinberg sits down with human rights advocate Yaqiu Wang to discuss the role of emerging technologies in China’s surveillance and censorship apparatus.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Arne Westad on ‘The Coming Storm’
Lawfare Senior Editor Michael Feinberg and Professor Arne Westad of Yale University, author of “The Coming Storm: Power, Conflict, and Warnings from History,” discuss 19th- and 20th-century power politics, the contemporary rise of China, and how the former can inform reactions to the latter.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: The Trials of the Trump Administration, April 3
In a live conversation on YouTube, Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Molly Roberts, Anna Bower, and Roger Parloff and Lawfare Associate Editor Katherine Pompilio to discuss Lawfare’s new database which is tracking the non-compliance with court orders by the government, Pam Bondi being fired as attorney general, legal challenges to President Trump’s new elections integrity executive order, 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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Archive: A World Without Caesars
From March 14, 2025: This episode of the Lawfare Podcast features Glen Weyl, economist and author at Microsoft Research; Jacob Mchangama, Executive Director of the Future of Free Speech Project at Vanderbilt; and Ravi Iyer, Managing Director of the USC Marshall School Neely Center. Together with Renee DiResta, Associate Research Professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown and Contributing Editor at Lawfare, they talk about design vs moderation. Conversations about the challenges of social media often focus on moderation—what stays up and what comes down. Yet the way a social media platform is built influences everything from what we see, to what is amplified, to what content is created in the first place—as users respond to incentives, nudges, and affordances. Design processes are often invisible or opaque, and users have little power—though new decentralized platforms are changing that. So they talk about designing a prosocial media for the future, and the potential for an online world without Caesars.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Archive: How to Steal a Presidential Election
From March 4, 2024: As the 2024 presidential election approaches, a vital question is whether the legal architecture governing the election is well crafted to prevent corruption and abuse. In their new book, “How to Steal a Presidential Election,” Lawrence Lessig and Matthew Seligman argue that despite the Electoral Count Reform Act of 2022, serious abuse of the presidential election rules remains a live possibility. Jack Goldsmith sat down with Lessig to learn why. They discussed the continuing possibility of vice presidential mischief, the complex role of faithless electors, strategic behavior related to recounts, and the threat of rogue governors. They also pondered whether any system of rules can regulate elections in the face of widespread bad faith by the actors involved.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: The Privacy Law That's Supposed To Be Protecting Us Online Turns 40
The Electronic Communications Privacy Act, which is designed to protect users' privacy—including privacy online—turned 40 this year. On March 6, Lawfare hosted an event at Georgetown Law marking the event and featuring panel discussions with the authors of our paper series, Installing Updates to ECPA, in which experts from various disciplines reflected on the law, what’s changed over the last 40 years, and how ECPA should be updated to meet today’s realities. On today's podcast, we're sharing the opening remarks from that event, featuring legendary Supreme Court advocate Michael Dreeban, who argued many of the landmark ECPA cases. He talked about where ECPA came from and how it evolved, how it relates to the 4th Amendment, and where the law stands now. You can watch the entire event and read the paper series on our website here. 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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Rational Security: The "Chicken Sh*t Bingo" Edition
This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Senior Editors Anna Bower, Kevin Frazier, and Kate Klonick to talk through the week’s big news in national security, including:“The X Post Facto Rule.” The Justice Department and lawyers representing Anthropic faced off last week in a Northern California courtroom over whether Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s X post and som related communications amounted to an official order and if the Pentagon’s supply chain risk designation retaliated against the company’s First Amendment-protected views, among other issues. On March 26, Judge Rita Lin, in that case, stayed the supply chain risk designation, ruling that the Pentagon had, in fact, retaliated unlawfully against Anthropic. We’re also waiting for another related decision from a D.C. Circuit panel, expected to come down any time now. What should we make of Judge Lin’s ruling, and do we expect the D.C. Circuit to follow suit? And what does it all mean for AI companies and their relationship with the government?“Strait Outta Options.” Oil, gas, helium, pharmaceuticals, and fertilizer—the ongoing conflict with Iran has upended global supply chains, with the Strait of Hormuz remaining closed as critical infrastructure in neighboring Gulf states faces Iranian attacks. The U.S. has started to feel the first of its effects through rising costs and a trepidatious stock market, reminiscent of the supply chain shortages felt during the coronavirus pandemic. It's unclear how severe and how long they will last, but what could be some of the national security and political implications if the supply chain shocks continue? And what does it mean for the trajectory of the Iran conflict?“Space: The Financial Frontier.” NASA astronauts launched this week on the Artemis II mission, the first crewed mission to orbit the moon in more than half a century. It’s the biggest step to date in the new emerging space race, most specifically with China—one driven predominantly by private actors, the biggest of whom, SpaceX, is preparing to make an unprecedentedly large initial public offering in coming weeks. How should we feel about this new, very different space race compared to past ones? And what might it mean, both for good and ill? In object lessons, Kate looks forward to filling the pages of her new notebook and ponders if she has so much to say that she’ll need another one. Anna wants immunity from ridicule for her love of Survivor. Scott is impatiently waiting for his chance to binge all of the new season of For All Mankind. And Kevin applauds boring AI—that is, using new technology to ease enduring human challenges. 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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Beyond the Headlines: A History of U.S.-Iran Relations
In this episode, Ariane Tabatabai sits down with historian, John Ghazvinian, the author of, “America and Iran: A History, 1720 to the Present,” to discuss U.S.-Iran relations. They take a step back from the current conflict to talk about the key events that have shaped the relationship between the two countries and their perceptions of one another. 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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: Joel Braunold on West Bank Violence and Israel’s New Lebanon Offensive
For today’s episode, Lawfare Senior Editor Scott R. Anderson sits down with Joel Braunold, the Managing Director of the Center Project, for the latest in their regular series on recent developments in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.Together, they dig deep into the spike in violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, Israel’s new military offensive in southern Lebanon, how they both relate to the ongoing conflicts in Gaza and Iran, and what Israel’s expanding range of hostilities may mean for the Israeli parliamentary elections scheduled for later this year.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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: What’s Influencing Politics Online? X’s Algorithm, Creators, and the New Persuasion Machine
In this episode, Lawfare Contributing Editor Renée DiResta speaks with Nathaniel Lubin, co-author of “How Social Media Creators Shape Mass Politics,” and Philine Widmer, co-author of a recent Nature paper, “The Political Effects of X’s Feed Algorithm.” Together, they discuss two different layers of online influence—a platform’s algorithms and the trusted voices inside it—and their implications for mass politics.The conversation explores what happens when recommendation systems shape what people see, and what happens when creators shape how people interpret it. They discuss whether algorithms move political attitudes by shifting exposure and salience, whether creators are persuasive because audiences trust them, and what these findings suggest about political influence in an environment increasingly organized by feeds, rankings, and parasocial relationships.Additional reading: “Twitter Is Not Real Life,” by Lakshya Jain in The Argument, February 5, 2026“X Really Is Pulling Users to the Right,” by John Herrman in Intelligencer, February 21, 2026To 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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lawfare Daily: The Trials of the Trump Administration, March 27
In a live conversation on YouTube, Lawfare Editor in Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Molly Roberts, Anna Bower, and Roger Parloff, discuss a judge granting a preliminary injunction in Anthropic’s suit challenging its supply chain designation, a Friday morning hearing in Fulton County’s suit over the federal government seizing ballots from 2020, a new push from the Trump administration to investigate New York AG Letitia James, 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.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.