''Lawfare'' is an American

blog A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order ...

dedicated to

national security National security, or national defence, is the security and defence of a sovereign state, including its citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of government. Originally conceived as protection against military atta ...

issues, published by the Lawfare Institute in cooperation with the

Brookings Institution The Brookings Institution, often stylized as simply Brookings, is an American research group founded in 1916. Located on Think Tank Row in Washington, D.C., the organization conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in ec ...

. It has received attention for articles on Donald Trump's presidency.

Background

The blog was started in September 2010 by

Benjamin Wittes Benjamin Wittes (born November 5, 1969) is an American legal journalist and Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution, where he is the Research Director in Public Law, and Co-Director of the Harvard Law School–Brookings ...

(a former editorial writer for ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

''),

Harvard Law School Harvard Law School (Harvard Law or HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest continuously operating law school in the United States. Each class ...

professor

Jack Goldsmith Jack Landman Goldsmith III (born September 26, 1962) is an American legal scholar. He is a professor at Harvard Law School who has written extensively in the fields of international law, civil procedure, federal courts, conflict of laws, and na ...

, and

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

law professor Robert Chesney. Goldsmith was the head of the

Office of Legal Counsel The Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) is an office in the United States Department of Justice that assists the Attorney General's position as legal adviser to the President and all executive branch agencies. It drafts legal opinions of the Attorney ...

in the

George W. Bush administration George W. Bush's tenure as the 43rd president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2001, and ended on January 20, 2009. Bush, a Republican from Texas, took office following a narrow victory over Democratic ...

Justice Department A justice ministry, ministry of justice, or department of justice is a ministry or other government agency in charge of the administration of justice. The ministry or department is often headed by a minister of justice (minister for justice in a ...

, and Chesney served on a detention-policy task force in the

Obama administration Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. A Democrat from Illinois, Obama took office following a decisive victory over Republican ...

. Its writers include law professors, law students, and former

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

and

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal ** Administrative assistant, Administrative Assistant, traditionally known as a Secretary, or also known as an admini ...

officials.

Donald Trump

''Lawfare'''s coverage of

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. More generally, it can b ...

and legal matters related to the

Trump administration Donald Trump's tenure as the List of presidents of the United States, 45th president of the United States began with Inauguration of Donald Trump, his inauguration on January 20, 2017, and ended on January 20, 2021. Trump, a Republican Party ...

has brought the blog significant increases in readership and national attention. In January 2017, the website's traffic was up by 1,101% from 12 months before.

Executive Order 13769

In January 2017

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) *President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...

tweeted "LAWFARE" and quoted a line from one of its blog posts that criticized the reasoning in the

Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (in case citations, 9th Cir.) is the U.S. federal court of appeals that has appellate jurisdiction over the U.S. district courts in the following federal judicial districts: * District ...

ruling that blocked Trump's first refugee-and-travel ban. Trump tweeted the excerpt minutes after the line was quoted on ''

Morning Joe ''Morning Joe'' is an American morning news and liberal talk show, airing weekdays from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time Zone, Eastern Time on the cable news channel MSNBC. It features former Republican Congressman Joe Scarborough r ...

''. Wittes, who supported the court ruling, criticized Trump for the tweet, asserting that Trump distorted the argument presented in the article. Wittes also wrote that it was disturbing that Trump cited the line "with apparently no idea who the author was or what the publication was, and indeed without reading the rest of the article", and that no one in the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...

vetted the tweet.

Dismissal of FBI Director James Comey

On May 18, 2017, ''Lawfare'''s editor-in-chief Benjamin Wittes was the principal source of an extensive ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' report about President Trump's interactions with

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...

Director Director may refer to: Literature * ''Director'' (magazine), a British magazine * ''The Director'' (novel), a 1971 novel by Henry Denker * ''The Director'' (play), a 2000 play by Nancy Hasty Music * Director (band), an Irish rock band * ''D ...

James Comey James Brien Comey Jr. (; born December 14, 1960) is an American lawyer who was the seventh director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 2013 until his dismissal in May 2017. Comey was a registered Republican for most of his adul ...

, who is a friend of Wittes, and how those interactions related to Comey's subsequent firing. Wittes also provided a 25-minute interview to ''

PBS NewsHour ''PBS NewsHour'' is an American evening television news program broadcast on over 350 PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virg ...

'' on the same subject. According to him, Trump's hug "disgusted" Comey. Wittes said Comey was not expecting a hug, adding "It was bad enough there was going to be a handshake." According to Wittes, Comey had been "disgusted" with Trump's attempts to publicly ingratiate himself with Comey, which Comey saw as calculated attempts to compromise him by agitating Democrats. Wittes elaborated on this shortly thereafter in a post on ''Lawfare''.

Trump's disclosure of classified intelligence

Several ''Lawfare'' contributors argued that Trump's reported disclosure of classified intelligence to Russia in mid-May 2017 was "perhaps the gravest allegation of presidential misconduct in the scandal-ridden four months of the Trump administration". The column further alleged that Trump's reported actions "may well be a violation of the President's oath of office".

Reception

Columnist

David Ignatius David Reynolds Ignatius (born May 26, 1950) is an American journalist and novelist. He is an associate editor and columnist for ''The Washington Post''. He has written eleven novels, including '' Body of Lies'', which director Ridley Scott adapt ...

described ''Lawfare'' as "one of the most fair-minded chroniclers of national security issues". According to

Daniel W. Drezner Daniel W. Drezner (born August 23, 1968) is an American political scientist. He is professor of international politics at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. He is known for his scholarship and commentary on International ...

, professor of international politics at the

Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy is the graduate school of international affairs of Tufts University, in Medford, Massachusetts. The School is one of America's oldest graduate schools of international relations and is well-ranked in it ...

Tufts University Tufts University is a private research university on the border of Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learning. ...

, ''Lawfare'' is an example of "outside intellectuals" who "exercised real influence in the Trump era". The blog has been criticized by attorney and journalist

Glenn Greenwald Glenn Edward Greenwald (born March 6, 1967) is an American journalist, author and lawyer. In 2014, he cofounded ''The Intercept'', of which he was an editor until he resigned in October 2020. Greenwald subsequently started publishing on Substac ...

. Writing in ''The New York Times'' he said the blog has a "courtier Beltway mentality" devoted to "serving, venerating and justifying the acts of those in power".

References

External links

*{{official website, www.lawfareblog.com American political blogs National security of the United States Publications established in 2010 Internet properties established in 2010 American legal websites Donald Trump