As national security agencies race to adopt AI, it is critical that Congress and the Biden administration shore up oversight of these technologies, which they acknowledge pose serious risks to privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) recently issued guidance that mandates transparency for federal uses of AI, identifies numerous uses that are presumptively rights- and safety-impacting, and requires minimum risk management practices—including a requirement that agencies provide individuals with notice and an opportunity to challenge decisions made usi ..read more

In recent decades, the international community has sought to address the particular harms that women and girls experience in war. International law now punishes sexual violence in armed conflict. And there’s the Women, Peace and Security agenda, which the U.N. Security Council launched in 2000 with Resolution 1325. That requires member States to consider impacts of conflict based on gender and to involve women more in all aspects of conflict prevention, management, and resolution. But while some harms rightly receive coverage and draw condemnation, other forms of violence are overlooked.  ..read more

Signup to receive the Early Edition in your inbox here. A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the past 24 hours. Here’s today’s news ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR Israel’s war cabinet met yesterday to discuss hostage deal negotiations, according to an Israeli official. The meeting comes ahead of a planned Israeli offensive into Rafah. Following the deliberations, an Egyptian delegation will travel to Israel today to discuss “security coordination,” the official said, adding that discussions included talks for a hostage deal that could avert a planned Israeli offensive in Rafah. L ..read more

Signup to receive the Early Edition in your inbox here. A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the past 24 hours. Here’s today’s news ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR A top Hamas official said the group would lay down its weapons if a two-state solution is implemented. The official told The Associated Press the group is willing to agree to a ceasefire of five years or more with Israel and that it would convert into a political party if an independent Palestinian state is established along pre-1967 borders. If that happens, Hamas’s military wing would dissolve, the official said. Abby ..read more

A grand jury in Arizona has returned an indictment for several close associates of former President Donald Trump as well as lower-level individuals who served as false electors in Arizona during the 2020 presidential election. The Office of Attorney General Kris Mayes has charged all of them with a conspiracy under Arizona state law to overturn the popular vote in the state. The list of indicted co-defendants includes seven (7) national figures: Mark Meadows, Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Boris Epshteyn,  Mike Roman, Jenna Ellis, and Christina Bobb. The eleven (11) other co-defendants are ..read more

In early February, we formed the Independent Task Force on the Application of National Security Memorandum-20 to Israel, whose report we provided to the Biden Administration on April 18. The National Security Memorandum 20 (NSM-20), adopted by President Joe Biden, directs the Department of State to seek assurances from partners involved in conflict and receiving U.S. military grant assistance that they would abide by U.S. and international law and also requires the Departments of State and Defense to report to Congress within 90 days on the extent to which such partners are abiding by their as ..read more

As tensions between Israel and Iran threatened to spark a broader regional conflagration, Washington levied a spate of new sanctions targeting Iran’s drone program. The sanctions, among other U.S. actions, seemed intended to reassure Israel and discourage it from an escalatory response. Whether or not they worked in this instance, they likely did no harm, but that is not always the case. Too often sanctions levied in the name of advancing peace and security have hidden costs that compromise their objectives. Washington should take steps to address sanctions’ downsides and make them more effect ..read more

This autocracy threat tracker is also available as a PDF file. The tracker was originally published on February 26, 2024 and is continually updated. Introduction Former President Donald Trump has said he will be a dictator on “day one.” He and his advisors and associates have publicly discussed hundreds of further actions to be taken during a second Trump presidency that directly threaten democracy, the rule of law, as well as U.S. (and global) security. These vary from Trump breaking the law and abusing power in areas like immigration roundups and energy extraction; to summarily and baselessl ..read more

Signup to receive the Early Edition in your inbox here. A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the past 24 hours. Here’s today’s news ISRAEL-IRAN CONFLICT Iran’s president Ebrahim Raisi said yesterday “there will be nothing left” of Israel if Iran is attacked again. “There will be nothing left of that entity,” Iranian state news agency IRNA reported Raisi as saying. Raisi’s comments were made on the second of his three-day official visit to Pakistan, where he warned that if Israel “commits another mistake and violates the sovereignty of the holy Iranian lands, the sit ..read more

Today, the United Nations Security Council holds its annual debate on Conflict Related Sexual Violence (CRSV). The “debate” is generally well-staged and highly performative. This year, the meeting will be chaired by Malta, and the program is expected to focus on preventing CRSV through demilitarization and gender-responsive arms control. The focus on demilitarization leverages gender mainstreaming into the planning and execution of disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration, and addresses the different needs of female and male ex-combatants along with the needs of their dependents. Gender ..read more