Congress
683 Articles
The Senate Killed JASTA, Then Passed It…
About a month ago, I wrote a long primer on JASTA (the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act), a bill that is designed to make it far easier for 9/11 victims and their families…
Can Detainees Plead Their Way Out of Guantánamo?
One of the more curious tidbits to emerge from the Senate Armed Services Committee’s draft of the FY2017 National Defense Authorization Act (which the Committee approved…
The 702 Reform Debate Is Just Heating Up
This post is the latest installment of our “Monday Reflections” feature, in which a different Just Security editor examines the big stories from the previous week or looks…
Are Republicans Serious About NSC Reform?
It appears the House Republican project to clip the National Security Council’s (NSC’s) wings may be a larger scale project than reflected in my last post. There, I discuss…
Obama Shouldn’t Wait for Congress to Ensure He Leaves Behind a Clearly Defined War
Against the backdrop of a collapsing ceasefire in Syria, President Obama announced last week that he approved the deployment of an additional 250 special operations troops to Syria,…
Feinstein-Burr: The Bill That Bans Your Browser
Last week, I criticized the confused rhetorical framework that the Feinstein-Burr encryption backdoor proposal tries to impose on the ongoing Crypto Wars 2.0 debate. In this…
Congress’s Embarrassingly Empty (National Security) Record
This week, we learned the United States will send 250 special operations troops to the war in Syria, bringing the publicly known total number of American troops operating in the…
Would JASTA Violate International Law?
Writing in The New York Times last Friday, Curt Bradley and Jack Goldsmith argued that the Justice Against State Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA) would “violate a core principle…
The National Security Council as FOIA “Agency”
Two weeks ago, Rep. Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.) introduced a bill that would define the National Security Council (NSC) as an “agency” for purposes of the Freedom of Information…
The FBI’s Warrantless Surveillance Back Door Just Opened a Little Wider
On Tuesday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) released a redacted version of an opinion by Judge Thomas F. Hogan of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance…
Feinstein-Burr, Encryption, and “The Rule of Law”
There’s a lot to say about the substance of the misguided anti-encryption legislation sponsored by Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Richard Burr, which was recently released as a “discussion…
Here’s What the Burr-Feinstein Anti-Crypto Bill Gets Wrong
The latest Crypto War is being fought on multiple fronts: behind closed doors, in the courts, and now in Congress. On April 13, Sens. Richard Burr (R-NC) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.),…