Hello and welcome to Background Briefing available 24-7 at Background Briefing.org. I'm Ian Masters,

and today we'll look into a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with a whistleblower complaint from inside the Intelligence Committee,

lodged in May of 2025, that charges highly classified intelligence was restricted for political purposes.

The Intelligence Committee's Inspector General considers the complaint the most top secret that he is dealt with,

which requires, quote, urgent concern, yet it was locked in a safe by the Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard for eight months and has only just reached the gang of eight to evaluate.

However, the lawyer for the whistleblower is concerned that what the

bipartisan heads of the House and Senate and Intel committees are finally getting from

Gabbard might not accurately reflect the whistleblower's complaint. Joining us is Scott Horton,

a former lecturer at Columbia Law School and a contributing editor at Harper's in Legal Affairs and National Security.

He serves on the American branch of the International Law Association and is represented a variety of journalists and whistleblowers.

Then with the last and only nuclear arms control treaty between the US and Russia officially ending today,

we will speak with John Walsall, who is the Director of Global Risk at the Federation of American Scientists,

a senior adjunct fellow at the Center for New American Security and a member of the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.

He previously served as a special assistant to President of the United States Barack Obama

for National Security Affairs and is a former senior director at the National Security Council

for Arms Control and Nonproliferation.

He also served from 2009 to 2012 as Special Advisor to Vice President Biden for nuclear security and nonproliferation

and as a director for nonproliferation on the National Security Council.

During his government service, he has been involved in almost every aspect of U.S. nuclear

weapons, deterrence, arms control, nonproliferation policy, including having helped

negotiate and secure the ratification of the new START

...