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A Victory for Guatemalan Democracy Feb 12, 2024

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On January 15, Bernardo Arévalo took office as the new president of Guatemala. The transfer of power had been far from assured: after Arévalo triumphed in August elections as an anti-corruption reformer, Guatemala’s political elite did their best to throw legal obstacles in his way and prevent him from taking power. His presidency represents a stunning victory for Guatemalan democracy, which has long been under threat. But there are plenty of difficulties still ahead.

To catch up on what’s been happening in Guatemala, Lawfare Senior Editor Quinta Jurecic spoke with Vaclav Masek, a Guatemalan sociologist and columnist. They discussed how Arévalo triumphed, the significance of his victory for Guatemala and the region, and what all this might tell us about the ability of democracies to resist authoritarian backsliding around the world.

If you’re interested in more on Arévalo, you can also listen to Quinta’s conversation from August with Manuel Meléndez-Sánchez about the election and Arévalo’s victory.

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Rational Security: The “Fecund Season” Edition Feb 11, 2024

Show notes

This week on Rational Security, Alan made his long-awaited return to the podcast for a (brief, so savor it) reunion with Quinta and Scott to talk over the week’s big national security news, including:

“Losing the Immunity Challenge.” Earlier this week, the D.C. Circuit rejected former President Trump’s attempt to appeal the denial of his claims of presidential immunity to criminal charges arising from Jan. 6. That issue is now primed for the Supreme Court. Will it take it up? And what will it decide?
“Ordeal or No Deal.” As Israel’s military offensive in Gaza continues, the United States is trying to facilitate a short-term hostage deal—and a longer term bargain that would incorporate Israel and Saudi Arabia into a security pact. How realistic are these proposals? And how might they impact the dynamics of the Gaza conflict?
“The Shakedown Breakdown.” Congressional Republicans who once insisted on tying Ukraine assistance to a border deal have now turned against any effort to hash out a border deal—even as House Republicans have also failed to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas or to pass their own stand-alone assistance bill for Israel. Where does this all leave aid for Ukraine? And what ramifications will this congressional dysfunction have moving forward?

For object lessons, Alan shared the thing he spent most of his time off on: his new substack, “The Rozy Outlook.” In light of this week’s oral arguments in Trump v. Anderson, Quinta recommended Mark Graber’s book on the 14th Amendment, "Punish Treason, Reward Loyalty." And Scott urged listeners to check out one of his favorite Twitter threads in recent memory, asking “who got that one Jeopardy clip”?

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Lawfare Archive: Julian Mortenson on 'The Executive Power' Feb 10, 2024

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From April 12, 2019: Julian Mortenson, Professor of Law at the University of Michigan, is the author of a remarkable new article entitled "Article II Vests Executive Power, Not the Royal Prerogative," in the Columbia Law Review and available on SSRN.

Recently, Benjamin Wittes spoke with the professor about the article, which Mortenson has been working on for years—as long as the two have known each other. The article explores the history of exactly three words of the U.S. Constitution—the first three words of Article II, to be precise: "the executive power."

Huge claims about presidential power have rested on a conventional understanding of these three words. Julian argues that this conventional understanding is not just partially wrong, or mostly wrong, but completely wrong, as a matter of history. And, he tries to supplant it with a new understanding that he argues is actually a very old understanding of what those words mean.

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Trump's Trials and Tribulations: Supreme Court Oral Arguments in the Trump Disqualification Case Feb 09, 2024

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On February 8, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Trump v. Anderson, on the Colorado Supreme Court's ruling that former President Donald Trump is disqualified from the office of the presidency under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and cannot appear on the 2024 presidential ballot.

On this week's “Trump's Trials and Tribulations,” recorded on February 8 in front of a live audience on YouTube and Zoom, Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Roger Parloff and Quinta Jurecic, Lawfare Legal Fellow and Courts Correspondent Anna Bower, and law professor at Indiana University Gerard Magliocca to talk about the oral arguments, how the justices may rule, and the implications of the ruling. They also checked in with the other Trump Trials in Fulton County, the Southern District of Florida, and D.C., to see what is new. And of course they took audience questions from Lawfare Material Supporters on Zoom.

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Chatter: The Global Citizenship Industry with Kristin Surak Feb 08, 2024

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Some people call it "investor citizenship" while others label it a "passport for sale" scheme. Either way, the last few decades have seen the global citizenship industry grow and evolve in ways that both reflect and impact issues around national sovereignty, tax regimes, international business, and global inequities.

David Priess chatted about these and related issues with political sociologist and author Kristin Surak, whose recent book The Golden Passport takes a multidisciplinary look at global mobility for the wealthy and the complex system that has developed around it. They discussed the new "most powerful passport" rankings, the types of people who seek different citizenship through investment, Turkey's rise as a major Citizenship By Investment (CBI) player, the rise and fall of the program in Cyprus, how intermediary companies power the CBI system, the trailblazing CBI role of St. Kitts and Nevis, the challenges of European countries attempting to start and keep CBI programs, differing perceptions of CBI around the world, issues of equity and ethics, and the recent phenomena of digital nomads.

Among the works mentioned in this episode:

"The Henley Passport Index", Henley & Partners

The book The Golden Passport: Global Mobility for Millionaires by Kristin Surak

The book Moneyland by Oliver Bullough

The book Making Tea, Making Japan by Kristin Surak

The book The Despot's Guide to Wealth Management by J. C. Sharman

Chatter is a production of Lawfare and Goat Rodeo. This episode was produced and edited by Cara Shillenn of Goat Rodeo. Podcast theme by David Priess, featuring music created using Groovepad.

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Molly Reynolds and Eric Ciaramella on the Ukraine Supplemental Feb 08, 2024

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It's been a wild and woolly week on Capitol Hill with respect to the border, Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan, and a lot of other stuff. On Wednesday, the Senate was preparing to vote both on the apparently doomed supplemental deal that included border security provisions, and on a deal without them.

Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editor Molly Reynolds and Eric Ciaramella of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace to discuss the congressional politics and also the situation in Ukraine that drives the need for congressional action. They talked about how the border and the Ukraine supplemental got wrapped up together, how they're being disaggregated, whether there is a path forward for Ukraine aid now that the Senate has killed the compromise, what's happening on the ground in Ukraine, and what would happen if the United States doesn't act.

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The Aftermath S2E3 - #StormtheCapitol Feb 07, 2024

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Social media was key to Jan. 6. End to end. It was key to gathering the crowd that stormed the Capitol. It was key to generating the sentiment that led people to drop their lives to come to Washington willing to commit crimes. It was key to sending them home when the deed was done. Of course, we’re all on social media. But how does social media propel people to action, even inspire them to move from online to on the ground—and to the grounds of the Capitol? It’s impossible to track. But we know that some accounts wielded enormous influence, and none more so than Donald Trump’s. The thing is, Trump wasn’t the only one behind his social media face. He had one trusted aide who ran the accounts with him.

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The D.C. Circuit Rejects Trump's Presidential Immunity Claim Feb 07, 2024

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On February 6, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected former President Donald Trump's appeal of his presidential immunity defense in the federal government's Jan. 6 case against him. Lawfare Editor-in-Chief Benjamin Wittes sat down with Lawfare Senior Editors Quinta Jurecic, Scott R. Anderson, and Roger Parloff, and Lawfare Executive Editor Natalie Orpett, in front of a live audience on YouTube and Riverside for a deep dive into the ruling, its meaning, and the court’s unanimity. They also discussed what comes next and what the Supreme Court might do in response.

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Prosecuting Sexual and Gender-Based Violence in Armed Conflict Feb 06, 2024

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Among the many horrific stories emerging out of the conflicts in Ukraine and Israel/Gaza are instances of sexual and gender-based violence. It’s an issue that is pervasive in many armed conflicts, and yet, even now, it’s often treated as an afterthought. There are a lot of reasons for that, but one of the lesser-appreciated ones is the limitation of existing law. Lawfare Executive Editor Natalie Orpett spoke with Fionnuala Ní Aoláin, a professor at University of Minnesota Law School and a former UN Special Rapporteur. They talked about the legal framework around sexual and gender-based violence, the challenges of prosecuting these acts of violence as international crimes, and where the law fails.

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Riana Pfefferkorn and David Thiel on How to Fight Computer-Generated Child Sexual Abuse Material Feb 05, 2024

Show notes

One of the dark sides of the rapid development of artificial intelligence and machine learning is the increase in computer-generated child pornography and other child sexual abuse material, or CG-CSAM for short. This material threatens to overwhelm the attempts of online platforms to filter for harmful content—and of prosecutors to bring those who create and disseminate CG-CSAM to justice. But it also raises complex statutory and constitutional legal issues as to what types of CG-CSAM are, and are not, legal.

To explore these issues, Associate Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota and Lawfare Senior Editor Alan Rozenshtein spoke with Riana Pfefferkorn, a Research Scholar at the Stanford Internet Observatory, who has just published a new white paper in Lawfare's ongoing Digital Social Contract paper series exploring the legal and policy implications of CG-CSAM. Joining in the discussion was her colleague David Thiel, Stanford Internet Observatory's Chief Technologist, and a co-author of an important technical analysis of the recent increase in CG-CSAM.

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