Executive Branch
Just Security’s expert authors provide analysis of the U.S. executive branch related to national security, rights, and the rule of law. Analysis and informational resources focus on the executive branch’s powers and their limits, and the actions of the president, administrative agencies, and federal officials.
4,711 Articles
Ongoing “Drone Strikes” in Yemen Raise Four Questions
From Saturday to Monday morning, the US has reportedly been carrying out a series of air strikes in Yemen, delivering multiple blows to Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).…
Second Circuit Orders Release of Redacted OLC Aulaqi Memo
A big morning for courts and national security… next up is this immensely significant decision from the Second Circuit in New York Times v. Department of Justice, which,…
Justice Breyer’s Concurrence in Hussain
As Marty predicted back in March, the Supreme Court’s denial of certiorari this morning in the latest Guantánamo case to reach the Court–Hussain v. Obama–came…
Weak Tea: Seymour Hersh Elaborates His Views on Why to Trust Russian Spies
If you have been following the response to Sy Hersh’s claims that rebels—and not Assad’s forces—used chemical weapons in the fateful attacks on civilians in Syria in August…
Ukraine accepts ICC Jurisdiction but stops short, way short
The Registrar of the International Criminal Court has announced that it has received a declaration from Ukraine accepting jurisdiction for international crimes committed on its…
New Editors’ Picks Reading List: IHRL on Privacy and Surveillance
As regular readers will likely recall, in recent weeks there has been much discussion here on the pages of Just Security (and elsewhere) on important questions regarding the extraterritorial…
Letter to the Editor from former U.S. Army JAG replying to Ryan Goodman on recent amends legislation
As a former judge advocate of the U.S. Army who served as a claims officer in Iraq for 14 months, I strongly support the new statute that allows for payments to be offered to civilian…
New study may explode some myths about drones (and may create new ones)
The CNA Corporation, a non-profit research and analysis organization which runs the Center for Naval Analyses, recently published an important report by Larry Lewis, entitled Drone…
New Statute Provides Amends to Foreign Civilians Killed by the United States – but only if they’re “friendly”
Earlier this month, Just Security published a guest post by Sahr Muhammedally outlining a new congressional statute whereby the Defense Department can now move ahead in establishing…
State of play of the SSCI report on the CIA interrogation program: the relationship between declassification and disclosure
Last Thursday, Senator Diane Feinstein, the Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI), issued a statement that the SSCI had voted that afternoon “to…
Hersh’s Syria Conspiracy Theory: The CIA and Intelligence Oversight Questions
In a previous post, I discussed the Senate Intelligence Committee report on the attack against U.S. facilities and personnel in Benghazi, Libya. That post contemplated bias by…
The al-Aulaqi Opinion and Fourth Amendment “Seizures”
Friday’s decision by Judge Collyer, in which she dismissed Bivens claims brought by the families of Anwar al-Aulaqi, his son Abdulrahman, and Samir Khan (arising out of their…