The Lawfare Podcast: Ensuring the Continuity of Congress

Jen Patja, Molly E. Reynolds, John Fortier, Greg Jacob

Friday, May 6, 2022, 12:00 PM

Published by The Lawfare Institute
in Cooperation With

The COVID-19 pandemic, disputed elections and threats against election officials have brought back into focus a set of questions first raised for many after the terrorist attacks of September 11. What would happen if a large number of members of Congress were dead, incapacitated or otherwise unable to meet to do the work of the country?

A new report from the American Enterprise Institute’s Continuity of Government Commission explores these questions. Lawfare senior editor and Brookings senior fellow Molly Reynolds sat down with Greg Jacob, a member of the commission, and AEI’s John Fortier, the commission's executive director, to discuss the continuity challenges facing Congress and what we might do to address them.

Jen Patja

Jen Patja is the editor and producer of the Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.

Molly E. Reynolds

@mollyereynolds

Molly Reynolds is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. She studies Congress, with an emphasis on how congressional rules and procedure affect domestic policy outcomes.

John Fortier

John C. Fortier is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he focuses on Congress and elections, election administration, election demographics, voting (and absentee voting), the US presidency, and the Electoral College. He is the executive director of AEI's Continuity of Government Commission.