The Week that Was: All of Lawfare in One Post
Published by The Lawfare Institute
in Cooperation With
On Friday, Roger Stone, the longtime associate of President Trump, was indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Quinta Jurecic shared the indictment. Susan Hennessey, Quinta Jurecic, Matthew Kahn, Lev Sugarman, and Benjamin Wittes offered an analysis of its contents and implications.
In other Mueller news, Matthew Kahn posted the redacted cert petition filed by an unnamed foreign government-owned company in the mystery grand jury subpoena case.
Barbara McQuade and Chuck Rosenberg debated the question of whether attorney general nominee William Barr should accept the recusal advice from career ethics officials at the Justice Department.
Jen Patja Howell shared the most recent edition of the Rational Security podcast, in which Susan Hennessey, Tamara Cofman Wittes, Shane Harris, and Benjamin Wittes discussed the BuzzFeed News reporting on Michael Cohen, the new national intelligence strategy (which Matthew Kahn shared), and other topics:
Bob Bauer analyzed whether the Senate has a constitutional duty to try impeachment cases.
On Tuesday’s Lawfare Podcast, Molly Reynolds and Margaret Taylor explained what to expect in national security policy from the 116th Congress:
Before the Congress and the White House reached an agreement on Friday to end the government shutdown, Lev Sugarman summarized the FBI Agents Association report on how the shutdown was affecting federal law enforcement. Matthew Kahn posted the video that FBI Director Christopher Wray shared with the FBI workforce explaining his stance on the shutdown. Ryan Scoville analyzed whether the president has the power to stop military support foreign travel by members of Congress during a shutdown.
Scott Anderson explained that well before proposing a national emergency to direct the military to build a border wall, the Trump administration’s border policies already raised constitutional quandaries.
Aurel Sari analyzed the law of armed conflict obligations faced by those defending an urban area during combat.
Matthew Kahn posted the Supreme Court’s order allowing the Trump administration’s ban on military service by transgender people to go into effect pending litigation. Sarah Grant explained what comes next in that litigation.
Kahn posted Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s petition for a writ of mandamus from the D.C. Circuit halting his trial by military commission pending the impanelment of a Court of Military Commissions Review to resolve ongoing controversies in the case. And Brenna Gautam and Sarah Grant summarized the latest updates in the military commission of Abd al Hadi al Iraqi.
Annika Lichtenbaum dissected the security environment in the Sahel and the corresponding U.S. counterterrorism operations ongoing there.
In this week’s Foreign Policy Essay, Morgan Kaplan assessed the U.S.’s strategy of working “by, with and through” local partners in Syria and Iraq.
Matthew Kahn shared the National Security Law Podcast, in which Bobby Chesney and Steve Vladeck discussed military commission litigation before the D.C. Circuit, FISA sunsets, Venezuela, and more.
In technology policy matters. Nate Cardozo and Seth Schoen critiqued the GCHQ’s new exceptional-access proposal. Rachel Brown and Preston Lim rounded up the latest news on U.S.-China technology issues for this week’s SinoTech.
Stewart Baker posted this week’s Cyberlaw Podcast, covering a recent judicial ruling granting Fifth Amendment protections to biometric phone security and more:
And Jen Patja Howell shared Saturday’s Lawfare Podcast featuring a discussion between Benjamin Wittes and Ian Bassin of Protect Democracy on the proper role of litigation in the course of protecting democratic principles:
Andrew Miller unpacked the Trump administration’s Israeli-Palestinian peace plan and its chances of success in the current political context.
And in the third installment of her series on climate change and national security, Michelle Melton examined the history of international negotiations on climate matters and the domestic regulatory framework in the United States that interacts with it.
And that was the week that was.
