Anna Bower, Eric Columbus, Troy Edwards, Michael Feinberg, Molly Roberts, and Benjamin Wittes raised and answered questions related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) search of the Fulton County, Georgia election hub as part of an investigation seemingly tied to revived 2020 election fraud claims, despite years of courts finding no evidence of wrongdoing in Georgia’s vote count. The team’s queries covered topics such as the legal basis for the warrant, the statute of limitations, the unusual involvement of Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard, and more.
On Lawfare Live, Roger Parloff, Bower, Roberts, and Columbus sat down to discuss the Federal Bureau of Investigation search of an election office in Fulton County, Georgia, the arrest of protestors in Minnesota, and more.
Parloff blogged live from the hearing where U.S. District Court Judge Katherine Menendez decided on whether to issue an extraordinary order that would pause the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) deployment of thousands of federal agents in Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis and St. Paul.
Ilya Somin explained the state of Minnesota’s 10th Amendment anti-commandeering argument in its lawsuit to pause Operation Metro Surge. Drawing on precedent and the Trump administration’s statements, Somin warned that if courts permit the federal deployment to continue, it would set a dangerous precedent that allows the executive to strong-arm states using force, disruption, and threats.
On Rational Security, Scott Anderson sat down with Alan Rozenshtein, Columbus, and Roberts to delve into two of the week’s big national security events, including the killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis at the hands of Border Patrol agents, Anthropic’s release of a “constitution” for its Claude artificial intelligence (AI) model, and more.
On Lawfare Daily, Wittes sat down with Olivia Manes, Parloff, Bower, and Columbus to discuss the search of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson’s home, the Justice Department’s criminal inquiries into Minnesota state officials, oral arguments at the Supreme Court in President Trump’s attempt to fire Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve, and more.
On Lawfare No Bull, Marissa Wang shared audio from former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s Jan. 22 testimony before the House Judiciary Committee, in which he discussed indictments previously brought against President Trump, the Jan. 6 investigation, the decision to subpoena congressional phone records, and more.
On Lawfare Daily, Kyle Cheney joined Parloff to discuss the thousands of habeas corpus cases that challenge the Trump administration’s policy requiring mandatory detention of undocumented immigrants. The pair parsed through how judges have ruled, how those rulings mesh with political expectations, the potential for appeal, and more.
Wittes reflected on the dissonance of traveling from a country mired in political self-sabotage to Ukraine, a country at war to preserve its existence. Writing from Kyiv, Wittes contended that Ukrainian society views dysfunction in the U.S. as a direct variable shaping their survival.
On Lawfare Daily, Wittes spoke with Elizabeth Tsurkov about her 903 days of captivity in Iraq under Kata’ib Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed militia. Tsurkov shared the realities of her life in detention, the sociological observations she took of her captors while imprisoned, how countries responded to efforts to secure her release, and more.
John Drennan and Ariane Tabatabai assessed how President Trump’s aggressive posture toward the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)—marked by threats of annexation, tariffs, and conditional security guarantees—undermines U.S. national security by eroding the trust that sustains the alliance. The authors contend that by treating its allies as adversaries, the administration risks a fragmented NATO, reduced cooperation across Europe, and a future in which the U.S. faces global threats with fewer partners, weaker legitimacy, and diminished security.
On Lawfare Daily, Roberts spoke with Tabatabai and Drennan about President Trump’s threats to annex Greenland and how they have affected relations between the U.S. and its allies. The trio also discussed its implications for the U.S. and NATO, how U.S. adversaries have reacted to these shifting relationships, and more.
Noah Tan warned that the Nexperia chip crisis exposes the limits and dangers of unilateral U.S. export controls. Tan argued that these export controls are only effective if the U.S. and its allies coordinate; otherwise, U.S. policy will continue to harm its allies while failing to curb China’s leverage.
Vivian Dong argued that President Trump’s demand that Nvidia and other chipmakers pay a percentage of its sales in China in exchange for export licenses without congressional approval is illegal and possibly unconstitutional. Dong highlighted how a wide range of actors—chip competitors, cloud providers, AI firms, customers, and even U.S. states—could have standing to sue.
Brandon L. Van Grack, Haydn Forrest, and Emilee Karr explained how states are rapidly expanding their own versions of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) in ways that increase compliance risks for companies and nonprofits with overseas ties. The authors posited that these “baby FARA” laws signal states’ growing willingness to assert foreign affairs powers and create new, uneven regulatory burdens beyond traditional federal oversight.
In the latest edition of Lawfare’s Foreign Policy Essay series, Jeffery Tobin explained how governments’ increased use of emergency powers to expand executive authority around the globe, including the U.S., is harming democratic systems and blurring the lines between necessary action and executive overreach.
Gabor Rona examined how the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy (NSS) and its military operations in Venezuela reflect a rejection of the rules of international order in favor of regional dominance and power. Rona posited that by replacing legal justification with a Monroe Doctrine-style logic, the strategy erodes U.S. legitimacy, weakens alliances, and undermines the civic, pluralist foundations of American leadership.
Patrick Hulme, Katherine Irajpanah, and Andrew Kenealy analyzed thousands of statements from U.S. policymakers demonstrating significant polarization in Congress following U.S. military operations in Venezuela and the capture of Nicolás Maduro. The authors explained that their findings suggest that the president’s war powers are constrained more by political risk than by law.
Tyler McBrien shared the Trump administration’s 2026 U.S. National Defense Strategy, which identified the U.S.'s four lines of effort aimed to strengthen U.S. ally burden-sharing and defend U.S. interests against potential opponents.
On Lawfare Daily, Andrew J. Grotto and Jim Dempsey joined Justin Sherman to discuss their recent study on the U.S. military’s domestic cybersecurity risks and how adversaries could exploit those flaws. The trio also discussed the Pentagon’s Energy Resilience Program, the myth of the “air gap,” what the threat landscape could look like in the coming years, and more.
Jason Healey posited that U.S. cyber regulation should trade in old compliance methods for more agile, technology-driven oversight built around AI, automation, and continuous testing to deliver stronger security at a lower cost and greater flexibility.
In the latest edition of the Seriously Risky Business Cybersecurity Newsletter, Tom Uren explored efforts to curb abusive commercial spyware through the Pall Mall Process, the effectiveness of U.S. and U.K. telecommunications regulations against Chinese hacking operations, and more.
Renée DiResta and Berin Szóka explained how the “nudification” scandal from X’s Grok AI model exposes how absolutist free speech rhetoric is used to evade accountability for real-world harm caused by generative AI. DiResta and Szóka then explored what lawmakers, oversight agencies, and state attorneys could do to protect individuals from abusive AI use.
Kevin Frazier reviewed Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei’s call for evidence-based AI governance to safeguard against disastrous AI outcomes. Frazier largely agreed with Amodei’s five proposed principles and emphasized that lawmakers should rely on experts and data-driven guardrails in their approaches to AI regulation.
Jakub Kraus assessed how Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-Texas) Sandbox Act would allow AI companies to bypass federal regulations. Kraus explained that the act would—rather than help accelerate U.S. AI innovation—shift power away from federal agencies and Congress, thus limiting democratic oversight.
Cullen O’Keefe and Frazier delved into the future of regulatory compliance with AI at the helm. O’Keefe and Frazier proposed that policymakers should implement automatability triggers that preserve a balance between innovation and regulation.
Jason R. DiNapoli posited that the most consequential use of AI in government will be a centralized “presidential model” used by the executive as a decision-making tool. Drawing on analogies to corporate AI use and growing AI adoption across the executive branch and military, DiNapoli contended that such a model is unavoidable given its potential to manage complexity and information overload.
On Scaling Laws, Brett Orrell joined Frazier to answer weighty questions on how AI will change our economy, the nature of our work, the labor market, how Americans can best navigate the AI transition, and more.
And that was the week that was.
