Why Did DHS Compile an Intelligence Report about Lawfare’s Editor in Chief?
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 9 November 2022
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In the summer of 2020, Lawfare’s editor in chief Benjamin Wittes found out that he had been the subject of intelligence reports compiled by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis. It was a bizarre but troubling revelation, and it raised a lot of questions, not only about the propriety of those reports but also about the practice in general. Who else was I&A compiling intelligence reports about and on what basis? So, Ben filed a FOIA request and subsequently a lawsuit in hopes of getting some answers. He's written about this matter for Lawfare a number of times, including in an update published yesterday.
Lawfare executive editor Natalie Orpett sat down with Ben to talk through it all. They discussed the background of the case, why so-called open source intelligence reports can be so dangerous, and what we've learned about DHS over the course of the litigation.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
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| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:29.0 | So one of the bases in which the government can withhold material is, |
| 0:39.0 | and it's a legitimate basis, is that the material relates to intelligence sources and methods. |
| 0:47.0 | And the government has redacted a whole lot of material on that basis |
| 0:54.0 | from the stuff that it has produced to me. |
| 0:58.0 | And normally I would just kind of roll my eyes and say, |
| 1:02.0 | you know, I'm sure they're being overprotective, but what else. |
| 1:06.0 | But this instance of it made me really perk my eyebrows up |
| 1:12.0 | because the intelligence source in question, so-called, appears to be me. |
| 1:20.0 | I'm not only Orpet, executive editor of LawFair, |
| 1:24.0 | and this is the LawFair podcast, November 9th, 2022. |
| 1:29.0 | In the summer of 2020, LawFair's editor-in-chief Benjamin Widis, |
| 1:34.0 | found out that he had been the subject of intelligence reports, |
| 1:37.0 | compiled by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Intelligence and Analysis. |
| 1:41.0 | It was a bizarre but troubling revelation, and it raised a lot of questions. |
| 1:46.0 | Not only about the propriety of those reports, but also about the practice in general. |
| 1:51.0 | Who else was INA compiling intelligence reports about, and on what basis? |
... |
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