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Rational Security: The “Don’t Upset the Masks” Edition

The Lawfare Podcast

Wed Oct 15 2025

Summary

The Lawfare Podcast: Rational Security – The “Don’t Upset the Masks” Edition

Date: October 15, 2025
Panel: Scott Anderson (C), Benjamin Wittes (D), Kate Klonick (B), Molly Roberts (A)

Overview:

In this edition of Rational Security, the Lawfare team dives deep into three main topics: the Trump administration’s new peace plan for Gaza and the first return of hostages, an unprecedented politicization of messaging during the ongoing U.S. government shutdown, and China’s dramatic move to restrict rare earth exports, escalating its tech war with the U.S. The team delivers both serious and skeptical takes on historic events, legal debates, and the shifting sands of global economics, all while maintaining their trademark blend of intellectual rigor, dry humor, and dire caution.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Trump Administration’s Gaza Peace Plan: Ceasefire & Return of Hostages

[05:48–31:33]

The Context & What’s Happened

After two years of conflict, the U.S.-brokered peace plan has produced a “triumphal” speech by President Trump at the Israeli Knesset, followed by a peace conference in Sharm el Sheikh.
All living Israeli hostages have been returned from Gaza; in exchange, Israel released hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including some high-profile members of Hamas (but not all).
The plan is applauded worldwide, with both Democrats and Republicans celebrating—an unusual moment of bipartisan and global agreement.

Skepticism & Limitations

Ben Wittes:
- Warns this is, crucially, a ceasefire, not a real peace.
- Quote [11:21]:
  “It is a very good thing to have a ceasefire ... to get the 20 living Israeli hostages out ... The taking of hostages is a great war crime and the return of hostages is a positive good.”
- But cautions, “a major speech to the Knesset by an American president and a big peace summit all seems to me to be wildly premature. This is not a matter of peace. This is a matter of a ceasefire.” ([12:20])
- Doubts the Israeli government can or will survive this new situation more than a few weeks unless hostilities resume.
- Suggests there’s significant skepticism about moving toward the much-hyped “two-state solution,” seeing this as a fragile achievement.
Molly Roberts:
- Acknowledges Trump’s role—his ability to leverage personal relationships with Gulf states and Israel, as well as his public popularity in Israel—but remains unconvinced of a stable process:
  “I don’t really understand what is to stop Israel from saying, ‘Hey Hamas, you haven’t disarmed to our satisfaction, which I don’t understand why Hamas would do, and then deal's off.’ ... I don’t really understand how this doesn’t fall apart.” ([18:13])
Scott Anderson:
- Argues what’s extraordinary is a fundamental shift: “The thing that has really shifted in this whole regard is a complete 180 of the Republican Party’s approach to this conflict.” ([19:20])
- Walks through plan details: Israel denounces any annexation/permanent occupation of Gaza, guarantees right of return, Gaza to be governed by a reformed Palestinian Authority (PA)—returning to the Oslo framework.
- Concedes Israeli buy-in is uncertain at best (“...maybe these really are like, yeah, we're on step one and then we're going to bail. But the administration's got like its whole credibility baked into this.” [23:57])
Ben Wittes (skepticism on Trump’s staying power):
- “We live in a post-truth world ... the administration's view this week ... announce whatever you want and do your photo ops and then we'll raise Gaza to the ground tomorrow. I mean, like, why does any of this bind Netanyahu for a second?” ([25:01])
- Questioned the reliance on Trump’s ego: “I think you're relying on shame to regulate Trump ... Ego, not shame ... I think he will walk away from ever having done this in a heartbeat. He's flip flopped on Ukraine 30 times in a month and a half and his ego doesn't seem to have remotely taken a bruise...” ([27:05])
Molly Roberts (re: Trump’s speech):
- “It’s just hard to take it as seriously as one might wish. If he had said something that felt a little more concrete and coherent about a two state solution or really anything in that speech ... he got the ego boost that might be what he was looking for.” ([27:55])

The Takeaway

All agree the return of hostages and immediate pause to violence are meaningful positives.
The mood overall is deeply cautious—celebrating what’s immediately achieved but warning against premature triumphalism over peace prospects.

2. Partisanship and Lawbreaking: The Shutdown, the Hatch Act, and Political Messaging

[31:33–49:17]

What’s New

A government shutdown has led to almost all federal websites carrying banners blaming Democrats/the “radical left.”
Automated emails from federal employees and even airport videos repeat the political blame—which appears to be White House directives.

Legal and Ethical Analysis

Molly Roberts:
- Explains the Hatch Act’s Depression-era origins—made “to prevent federal employees from basically engaging in politics while on the job.”
- “It seems really obvious ... that this is exactly what’s happening now under the Trump administration. Unfortunately ... the Hatch Act ... is pretty weak and the letter of the law is not necessarily being violated as clearly as its spirit is here.” ([34:28])
Kate Klonick:
- “Anyone can file a complaint through the Office of Special Counsel. Then the OSC investigates and reports to the President, who has discretion to act.” ([39:20])
- “There is no private right of action ... You can file all these complaints ... the penalties ... can include reprimands, fines, suspension, or removal ... but [the President] will pardon all those people in the telephone book of pardons that comes out ... in 2028.” ([39:20])
- Her favorite ChatGPT response, about enforcement: “That’s a sharp and important question. And it exposes a potential accountability gap in the enforcement structure of the Hatch Act. I’m like, oh, you’re about as useful and sycophantic as one of my 1Ls.” ([41:41])
Ben Wittes:
- Clarifies: “The Hatch Act remedy is a report to the President. And the idea is that the President ... will ... take administrative action to correct it. ... It's just one where the remedy contemplated is super quaint relative to our current capital S situation.” ([41:46])
Molly Roberts:
- Points out the acting OSC head is a Trump loyalist with concerning ties—"the nominee ... described federal workers as bugmen who leach the diminishing lifeblood of the dying republic." ([44:01])
- Conclusion: “Nobody’s going to enforce any of these [laws]. And that’s exactly the problem. And the President is not going to do anything about it. And that’s the machine that Congress was talking about.” ([45:41])

Broader Implications

Panel laments erosion of legal norms, the lack of true remedies, and the hollowing of institutional guardrails that constrain political power.

3. China’s Rare Earth Export Controls: Escalating the Tech War

[49:17–65:19]

What Happened

China announced major new export controls on rare earth metals, threatening U.S. and allied access to materials crucial for high-tech manufacturing (especially semiconductors for AI).
Trump responds by threatening 100% tariffs on Chinese imports.
The restrictions are “not a ban” but require onerous licenses. Targets downstream products with even minimal Chinese-origin content, mirroring U.S. approach to chip exports.

How Big of a Deal Is This?

Kate Klonick:
- Lays out how China’s dominance of rare earths (70% global supply, 90% of refinement) makes global tech sectors deeply vulnerable ([53:34]).
- Notes that this move may be a bargaining ploy ahead of trade negotiations, with the real possibility that these controls never take effect if a deal is reached.
- Discusses difficulties in replacing China as a supplier, especially for high-purity materials like noble gases needed for chips (“creating places that will ... reliably give you very high quality neon gases ... there’s just a few places that do them really well ... it actually turns out that ... creating [these] ... in China is prohibitively difficult” [59:20]).
Benjamin Wittes:
- Offers a chemistry lesson: “Noble gases are not makeable because they ... don’t bond with other chemicals ... you have to just find them ... The world is running out of helium right now ... you can’t just collect it from the atmosphere.” ([58:13])

The Leverage and Broader Stakes

Scott Anderson:
- Points out the timing suggests China aims for leverage in broader trade disputes; restrictions don’t start until after scheduled U.S.-China talks.
- “These export controls could be a threat to the whole global economy. ... we have so much money pouring into infrastructure for AI development, which suddenly ... will have big economic ramifications all over the place.” ([61:50])
Molly Roberts:
- Adds that, on chips alone, the Biden administration’s export controls rather than Trump’s are the direct antecedents, but the move reflects broader trade war dynamics: “So definitely I think that this is about something bigger. ... as far as the impact ... as far as the impetus, I would guess, yes, it has to do with the broader trade war because on chips, Trump has been giving ground.” ([64:28])

Bottom Line

China’s move is a high-stakes power play amid a superpower tech rivalry—with huge consequences for AI, manufacturing, and the global economy.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On the Gaza ceasefire:
“Life under a ceasefire is better than life not under a ceasefire ... That is why ... the vast majority of Israelis have supported a deal ... for quite a number of months now ... most Palestinians have wanted a deal roughly like this for a goodly amount of time.”
— Ben Wittes ([11:21])
On the Trump administration’s role:
“The thing that has really shifted in this whole regard is a complete 180 of the Republican Party’s approach to this conflict.”
— Scott Anderson ([19:20])
On the limitations of U.S. law:
“Every time I talk on Rational Security, I’m like, and then there was this time we used to have the rule of law. And also I’m remiss to say that, like, the rule of law is actually maybe less of a thing than anyone ever thought it was.”
— Kate Klonick ([37:59])
On noble gases and chemistry:
“Helium ... has a limited supply ... And so if you happen to have a landmark mass that doesn't have pockets of argon gas ... it's not like you can just manufacture it. You got to buy it from someone who's got it.”
— Ben Wittes ([58:13])
On institutional accountability:
“The Hatch act remedy is a report to the President ... It’s just one where the remedy contemplated is super quaint relative to our current capital S situation.”
— Ben Wittes ([41:46])

Timestamps for Key Segments

| Topic/Segment | Start–End | | ---------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------- | | Show start, banter, introductions | [01:19–05:01] | | Gaza peace plan: events, praise, and skepticism | [05:48–31:33] | | U.S. government shutdown and partisan messaging (Hatch Act) | [31:33–49:17] | | China’s rare earth export controls & U.S. response | [49:17–65:19] | | Chemistry tangent: noble gases, history and consequences | [58:13–67:09] | | Object lessons (sunflowers, old sweatshirts, baking, gardening) | [67:09–73:22] |

Tone and Takeaways

The panel mixes sharp legal analysis, historical context, and realpolitik with playful, self-aware banter.
The team is vigilant in celebrating real policy accomplishments—hostage returns, ceasefire—but issues strong warnings against reading too much into early progress or believing bold political proclamations at face value.
Across the board, there's deep concern about the erosion of legal and institutional checks in both U.S. domestic politics and the international system.

Object Lessons & Memorable Closers

[67:09–73:22]
A lighthearted segment where:

Ben Wittes describes his campaign to mildly troll the Russian embassy with dead sunflowers, “littering” to annoy the neighbors in solidarity with Ukraine.
Kate Klonick reflects on the bittersweet realization of having a 20-year-old “practically new” sweatshirt and the passage of time.
Scott Anderson requests crowd-sourced ideas for recipes using his garden’s over-abundant ghost peppers.
Molly Roberts encourages listeners to try baking a Swedish Princess cake (prinsesstårta), with resources to make daunting recipes approachable.

Lawfare’s Rational Security continues to provide high-level analysis at the intersection of law and national security, with equal doses of skepticism and wit—a crucial resource for making sense of tumultuous times.

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Transcript

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C (1:19)

So the last time we had Kate on the podcast, we admired her extraordinary background, full of knickknacks. But now you have competition because we have Ben Whittis here, where his office is a whirlwind of knickknacks at any given moment. But I'm realizing we have like a nice parallel here because Kate, over your shoulder, including a shirtless Vladimir Putin wearing a bear as Ben's just pulled out for anybody watching on video. But Kate, you have, I think, was it Audrey Hepburn whose portrait that is over your picture. Grace Kelly. That's Grace Kelly over your shoulder. And Ben, you have only slightly less beautiful face over your shoulder. Tell us who this beautiful visage of vaguely ominous spookiness.

D (2:01)

I mean, it is a mask.

C (2:02)

Part of a set, actually, it's part.

D (2:04)

Of a set of very disturbed looking masks.

C (2:09)

Well, where, what? Like these have become an artifact of the law for offices that I feel like we haven't like given enough due credit for. Along with the weird severed bunny suit head that is also hanging on our shelves. That's a, that's a B roll for another time. Like, tell us about these masks. I want to know more about.

C (5:48)

Excellent. Well, we have a lot to talk about this week. It is nothing but weeks of big news these days, and this week was no exception. We got some stuff on the home front, some stuff overseas to talk about. So let's dig into it. Our first topic for today, piece by piece. The first phase of the Trump administration's peace plan for Gaza went into effect on Monday, resulting in the return of the last living hostages held by Hamas to Israel, among other exchanges. President Trump celebrated the moment with a triumphal speech in front of the Israeli Knesset, followed by a peace conference in Sharm el Sheikh, where the United States signed a joint statement with the heads of state of Egypt, Qatar and Turkey. While much work remains to be done on implementing the deal, even Trump's Democratic political rivals have lauded his efforts. But how much credit does the Trump administration really deserve? And where is the conflict likely to head from here? Topic 2 Uncivil Service since the US government shut down at the end of September, US agency websites and emails have been plastered with messages unequivocally blaming congressional Democrats and the radical left. It's an unprecedented use of government resources for a set of messages that looks quite political, exactly what the Hatch act, among other laws, was intended to prevent. Are these messages consistent with the law? And what is there for anyone to do about it? Out of our element China kicked off a major new phase in its economic war with the United States last week when it imposed major new export controls on rare earth metals and components derived from them, materials essential to various high end technologies, including the semiconductors that power artificial intelligence. President Trump has since responded with a threat to impose 100% tariffs on Chinese imports. But what China may really want is relaxation of export controls on AI related semiconductors imposed by the United States. How big a threat is China's weaponization of its rare earth exports? And how should the United States and allies respond? So our first topic has been the subject of a lot of inner office conversation, as it has been in, I think, a lot of corners in Washington, D.C. it's really been a pretty amazing week and a really amazing few days for those who follow the Middle east after more than two years, just over two years of brutal conflict in Gaza. We have, I think it's fair to say, the most concrete steps towards a resolution and a ceasefire of that conflict that we've seen to date. We've seen the return of all living hostages, Israeli hostages to Israel at this point. We've seen the return of many remains and not complete return. That's still a work in progress. Hamas says it's intending to return additional remains, although I think there's some dispute about exactly where some are, whether some are available even in their custody, or whether they're withholding some. And of course, this is just the first part of a much bigger peace plan that the Trump administration has laid out and that it's only gotten Hamas and Israel really solidly to sign on to the implementation of the first phase of which is a ceasefire and this exchange of prisoners, hundreds of prisoners held by Israel released as well, including many high profile figures associated with Hamas, although not some of the most high profile ones that Hamas was seeking in the late stages of the negotiations. It is, to say the least, a plan that is getting a lot of applause, really from every corner of the world. Chuck Schumer said very nice things about the Trump administration on its work on this plan. A number of other Democrats have. We've seen every European country was represented by almost entirely heads of states. So at the highest possible levels in the Sharm El Sheikh conference that took place this weekend, most of them congratulating the Trump administration and the various parties and to some extent each other on the role they all played in finally bringing about a ceasefire to this brutal conflict. President Trump himself was very warmly greeted by people ranging from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to President El Sisi of Egypt to Mahmoud Abbas, the President of the Palestinian Authority, with whom he has had a very, very difficult relationship, to say the least, since becoming president. United States, but at this point shared a photo op, and a fairly warm seeming one, as far as one can tell from the still photos that emerging for these things. It is really, really kind of extraordinary the degree to which you are seeing everybody happy about this next step. And President Trump by many accounts deserves a fair amount of credit, and he certainly thinks he does, as he celebrated with a very long winded, really, really, if I mean quite indulgent speech before the Israeli Knesset involving thanks to a long, long list of people before actually kind of getting into any prepared remarks. It was kind of extraordinary. You can tell the man feels like this is a big moment for him and he is savoring it. And to some extent that very well may be deserved. Ben, you have followed this conflict for a long time, both the Gaza conflict and the broader Israeli Palestinian conflict. I think you have slightly different instincts, or at least initially in our assessment, of exactly where the Trump administration, and President Trump himself deserves credit on this and how big an accomplishment this might be. But I want to turn the floor over to you first. Tell me about what your reaction is over these events of the last week. We actually talked about this a little bit last week's episode. You weren't able to join then. Part of the reason I want to talk about this week is because you are such a close watcher of these things. I think you have amazing instincts and a sense for how different actors are kind of triangling around this conflict. So talk to us about it. Where do you think this fits in, in the broader historical arc of both the Gaza conflict and the Israeli Palestinian kind of conflict as a whole?

D (10:47)

So the short answer is that I don't know. And I have spent way too many. I guess I was going to say years, but it's really decades now, assuming that we have reached some pivotal stage of the conflict, only to find that actually this thing operates in time measurements that are as yet unknown to humans, or at least to me. And so let's start with what's easy. It is a very good thing to have a ceasefire. It is a very good thing to have the daily destruction of Gaza not happening anymore, for however long that lasts. It is a very good thing to get the 20 hostages, 20 living Israeli hostages out of Gaza, some of them gaunt as skeletons. But, you know, the taking of hostages is a great war crime and the return of hostages is a positive good. It is a great thing to have an opportunity to bring in a lot of humanitarian aid for. For a lot of people in Gaza who are either starving or getting very close to starving. And so I do think the place to start is that life under a ceasefire is better than life not under a ceasefire. And that is true for Palestinians, that is true for Israelis, that is true. That is why, despite the Israeli government's position, the vast majority of Israelis have supported a deal roughly along these. This contours for quite a number of months now. And it is why, despite the brutal leadership of Hamas in Gaza, as far as we can tell, most Palestinians have wanted a deal roughly like this for a goodly amount of time. So it is good that it has happened. It is also commendable that the Trump administration helped bring it about, helped orchestrate it. And so that far, I am perfectly willing to go and say, hey, well done. The place where I am unsure, there's two places in Which I'm unsure. First of all, a major speech to the Knesset by an American president and a big peace summit all seems to me to be wildly premature. This is not a matter of peace. This is a matter of a ceasefire. Peace involves rebuilding Gaza. It involves putting a governance structure in place in Gaza. It involves creating a framework in which Israel does not feel the need to go in and raise Gaza to the ground again. It involves some different modus vivendi, even in the short and medium term in the West Bank. And I don't see there may be the seeds for some of that in this grandiose set of pronouncements that Donald Trump has made. But color me very skeptical of it until I see not, you know, the trucks will be rolling in with aid. And that's wonderful. But I want to understand before I credit the administration with something more than a ceasefire deal, they've clearly got that. I want to see that the ceasefire holds for more than a few days. I want to see that there is some second phase of this that is other than you've reduced Gaza from a kind of city state of 2 million people that's dependent on aid to a tent city that's of 2 million people that's dependent on aid. And I want to see some sense that the Israeli government, having gotten what it really cares about in this arrangement done, which is the 20 living hostages out, is not going to take the first provocation which will happen, by the way. There will be a provocation in or from Gaza to then begin hostilities again. And so the Trump administration, in its usual way, has created, you know, a world historical moment out of what is actually going to be a very fragile ceasefire. And, you know, show me the Treaty of Versailles before you declare Armistice Day to be more than an armistice. That's my first thing. The second thing is, I believe the Israeli government has been living on fumes for any number of months, and the only thing that has been keeping it going has been the fact that the war is ongoing. I don't believe it will survive more than a few more weeks now that unless the hostilities start again. And so I don't know what Israeli government you're going to be dealing with, you know, six months from now, nor do I know what government you're going to be dealing with in Gaza. And so for all of those reasons, I would say, look, if you're a family member of one of the hostages, if you're, you know, a Palestinian who's getting relief from the conflict, if you're somebody who's being demobilized in the, in the IDF right now, in reserves. Yeah. I do not begrudge you a lot of relief and joy at what happened over the weekend. But if you're a policy analyst in Washington watching the administration, I would just say go a little bit easy on the enthusiasm.

C (19:20)

That is, but that is actually what has happened. That's what's kind of extraordinary about this in like, kind of a wild way. Like what I think is really extraordinary, and Trump is literally, I think, the only person who could have pulled this off, in part because it's so brazen, is the big shift. The thing that has really shifted in this whole regard is a complete 180 of the Republican Party's approach to this conflict. And in terms of that, the position is willing to push on the Israeli government. We have to bear in mind since the first Trump administration, to some extent before that, but particularly since the first Trump administration, we have really seen the idea of a two state solution even being a viable option, of there being any sort of engagement for a long time with the Palestinians. That's lightened up a little bit. Trump 2.0, not in Trump 1.0 really being anathema. Remember, this is the Trump administration that recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, even though that was a case of territory that they occupied as a result of armed conflict, that recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, even though East Jerusalem is also considered to be occupied territory by many people in the international community because it was not supposed to be part of Israel initially under the postpartum UN sort of special arrangement. It is the group party that changed the long standing legal opinion since the 1970s that settlements in the west bank were per se legal international law and replace it with an illegal opinion that's never been released to the public, but that doesn't reach that same conclusion. Like it's kind of extraordinary. And his party has followed Trump's lead on that. They didn't need a lot of help to some extent. Like the Republican Party has always been more skeptical of the Palestinians the two state solution than others. But even the presidential Republican presidents like George W. Bush, that's ultimately the tack they really took, leaned in the two state solution like his father did before him. Instead, we've seen the Republican Party really become increasingly hostile to it. Republican Party platforms for the last three presidential elections, of which there are only two platforms because they recycled the 2016 one in 2020, doesn't talk about Palestinians at all. It just talks about backing Israel and opposing, I think the most recent one, something like Hamas based anti Semitic free speech issues, particularly on US Campuses. It's the Democratic platform that has actually several paragraphs in it for the last several years saying a two state solution is important because without that we're in a status quo where Palestinians are permanent, who live in west bank and Gaza are permanent second class citizens. And that's not acceptable under any standard of international law or humanity or general ethics. And that's not a sustainable status quo. We have to be moving towards some sort of better outcome in this arrangement. That's now the position that the Trump administration has staked out. It's really extraordinary.

B (39:20)

So basically, so Molly is totally correct, this has to come there that you file a complaint. Anyone can file a complaint through the Office of Special Counsel and you can submit these complaints online. Okay. Then the OSC ostensibly investigates and the investigation kind of ends up in a report to the President who has discretion to act. We can see where this is going in terms of problems for enforcement. There is no, no private right of action, which is a legal term for those not familiar. That means that, like, you can't sue in federal court for a violation. Like, I can't sue in federal court because I saw one of these notices in violation of the Hatch act on the Department of Agriculture website. And you can sue for damages to force the government to be punished, but you can file all these complaints with The Office of Special Counsel, as people have been doing. And then this was kind of the fun, the fun kind of part the fines or the punishment is there is the Hatch act was modernized in 2012 and they basically, the penalties can include reprimands, fine, suspension or removal or a bar from federal government for five years. So that would be really like, I don't. But it doesn't, like, it doesn't say, I guess this is actually the state or local employees that would have the bar from federal government. So that is, those are kind of the violations. And I don't know, like, I mean, I'm sure all of those people will be pardoned by President Trump before they leave office for their violations of the Hatch act in the telephone book of pardons that that comes out in, in, in 2028. Anyways, the thing that I thought was interesting was basically like I put into ChatGPT, like, here's all the stuff I know about, like how the Hatch act works. And I said, but what if the Office of the Special Counsel is in fact ordering the Hatch act violations in the first place or the President's office is ordering the hatchet violations in the first place? And chatgpt in his wisdom was like, that's a sharp and important question. And it exposes a potential accountability gap in the enforcement structure of the Hatch Act. I'm like, oh, you're about as useful and sycophantic as one of my one ls.

C (47:30)

It's tricky. I mean, when we looked at this, at the history of not just the Hatch act, but a lot of, like, internal dealing ethics guidelines, particularly in the executive branch. You've seen Congress not respond to violations, periodic, sporadic violations of the past. You've seen the executive branch and the Office of Legal Counsel interpret them narrowly, more and more narrowly, and including particularly in relation to the President and Executive Office of the President particularly, you've seen them really restrict a lot of ethics guidelines and how they apply there really since the 1980s. And then you saw Congress actually amend and restrict certain things, particularly about, like in employing family members. There used to be more strict statute restrictions on Congress actually rescinded and modified some of those, if I recall correctly. I think in the 1990s. That came up in the context of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump and others during the first Trump administration. So this is kind of a chronic difficulty. And it does raise this question like what could you do different if Congress ever did take this seriously? And maybe it will this time around, as I think it's learning the lesson of not having addressed it, I after the first Trump administration to actually amend something because you need to find a different sort of remedy other than executive branch self enforcement. And that's not something we've gotten comfortable doing. And frankly even efforts to do it raise big constitutional questions because we live in the era where at least solid majority of this Supreme Court is convinced of the unitary executive theory, which basically says the executive enforces the law. It's all beholden to the president. And so how do you have self enforcement the president? I'll say the one thing I've always drifted back to because it's intellectually interesting and it's a historical model that there that isn't used except in one context this day is the Ketam action, which is a situation in the False Claims act context where you can have what.

C (49:24)

But the original Ketam accent. Well, the main amazing thing is if you look in the key team action for those who may not know, Ketam is like where if there is corruption against or defraud against the government, a private citizen can sue who's otherwise uninvolved but becomes aware of it, sues on behalf of the government and either the government steps in, takes over the suit and the person gets a share of whatever money is recovered or in certain select circumstances, fairly narrow but select circumstances, that individual can pursue the suit on their own on the government's behalf and again gets a slice of whatever damages that they can recover, as well as attorneys fees. And what's crazy is that this mechanism was super widely used in the early Republic for like the first 30, 40, 50 years. And it makes a lot of sense because you were dealing with a government with super, super low levels of bureaucratic capacity. There wasn't an easy way to self police across the country in colonial times. So what did they do? They started these causes of action. And it's actually there's so much early practice that even in the heyday of Justice Scalia, the Supreme Court, and I think it was 2000, said Key Tame actions, at least in the False Claims act context, are totally constitutional, even though they are literally impossible to reconcile with standing doctrine as it's generally applied by the Supreme Court. They literally said yeah, but there's so much historical practice. Like we just have to accept it. There's like no avoiding it. This is 100% okay. It's crazy, but like this is sort of creative thinking I think Congress has to get into if they're actually going to try and address these things in an era where you don't have reliable executive branch leadership that's going to reliably enforce them. But who knows if Congress ever really gets around to it. Well, speaking of things that are a little out of the ordinary, we saw an extraordinary step by the government of the People's Republic of China this past week. It's a step that I feel like people have been worried about talking about the possibility of for frankly the better part of a decade now in certain circles, I think more popularly, at least for the last four or five years, particularly as we have been in this kind of escalating AI gold rush of an extent where we're super sensitive, have become increasingly sensitive to the components technology that is fueling AI, seen as like the critical technology for a huge economic and assorted other boons in the next five, 10 to 20 years. And that is China's control of rare earth metals, rare earth, critical minerals, rare earth minerals. It's got a bunch of different names, essentially a bundle of elements of which China controls, I think about 70% of the supply of known supply of and 90% of the refinement capacity of in the world that have become essential components to a variety of key technologies, whether it's armaments, whether it is high end vehicles, particularly electronic vehicles, and then perhaps most importantly semiconductors that are fuel and provide the horsepower that creates AI and powers AI. China this week imposed export controls suggesting that they were going to broadly recently require licensing to not only export any of these rare earths to foreign markets, particularly those that are engaged in semiconductor conductor productions. That's like the United States and some extent Europe I suspect, but also that they're going to limit the export of components that can contain all of them. And then they were going to do something that will sound a little familiar for those who have studied U.S. exports for the last 10 or 15 years. They were going to regulate downstream products that contained as little as 0.1% of Chinese origin rare earth minerals. They said, hey, we are going to actually regulate your ability to re export those to these target countries. We have a concern. Technically they're not banning it. Technically they're requiring licenses. But the history and experience that companies have had with these licenses is very difficult. They're very onerous. A Number of companies in the automobile space where these have become an issue with electronic motors over the last few years have actually shifted to buying entirely Chinese produced motors as a whole because they are not subject to this regime, whereas the components were. So the onerous bureaucratic requirements has the power to shape the whole supply chain to some extent, at least in certain industries. It's a pretty extraordinary step. So Kate, talk to us about why it's happening now and how big a deal this is, particularly from the perspective of AI, but also the impact that could have frankly on the whole US and to some extent global economy.

B (53:34)

Yeah, so this has been kind of, and I will admit that I am in the midst of getting up to date on kind of all of these supply chain issues around AI, all of the chip manufacturing and the chip wars, everything else and the global marketplace that kind of plays into, into this. It's absolutely fascinating. It's incredibly complicated. The ways in which and I love like a good system, I love like, you know, the ways in which these systems are kind of inter relying on each other in kind of very old fashioned ways. So for example, like there just was always a way that like China got certain it was cheap and easy and it was reliable. How they got certain types of necessary materials to do chip manufacture from overseas meant that they just never actually had to invest and had no pressure to invest invest in starting to manufacture them on their own. We obviously are seeing a real shift in, in globalization from the last 20 to 30 years. A lot less trust between countries, A lot less trust in trade partnerships, A lot less of the so called abundance or neoliberal mentality that we're going to everyone growing means that we all get better type of idea. And then, and so this was a bunch of chatter on Twitter and other places has basically said that this was actually a bargaining move that China put down ahead of apec. Like trying to basically put them in a position of strength going into those situations. And it's unclear if they'll follow through. But that effectively the fact that they're willing to do this and even to say this is just this massive, massive blow to kind of global relations and trust with China which they everyone is always kind of on pins and needles about because no one, you know, everyone is very aware of how reliant our entire technology sector is on Chinese technology and manufacturing. The thing that I will kind of point out on this is that I kind of, I'm wondering and one of the things, things that I have heard from some of the people and the Chinese China experts that I've talked to is this kind of had the same, this news from China, this announcement and Trump's retaliation to it on Friday in which he said that I can't believe China is doing this in a truth social tweet, I can't believe China is doing this. And we're going to react by putting 100% tariff on Chinese goods which was seen by many as like there needed to be a strong retaliation, but maybe not that strong, but that this was, this was actually China's move was seen as like a long term consequence of of Trump's earlier tariffs that he had like threatened and that this had the same effect on, on like the US Markets and like and the Trump administration was as surprised by China's announcement in this regard as China was surprised by Trump's decision to suddenly level out of the blue tariffs that like you wouldn't have passed under the Grammy, like anyone who studied the Gram Leach Bliley act wouldn't have passed. So like I think that there is, that was, that was kind of to put this in perspective, there have been a lot of I think surprises by people on both sides. This has long term intelligence and national security kind of implications. This has huge implications I think for trade deals going forward and the stability of like these zones for growth and inter reliance on all of these. I mean there's just a lot of pieces that are reliant on rare earth metals and there is going to be an increasing demand to diversify the sourcing on those. But anyways, one of the things that I really dug into today and I did want to kind of say talk about was the Dean Ball had this great thread on X. Dean Ball is a policy fellow@fathom.org and a senior fellow@fai. And he was kind of going into why this was such a big deal. And one of the things that we kind of pulled out, I think you and I, Scott, and we're kind of like that's an interesting observation, was that there were some consumable materials needed for semiconductor manufacturing from China that cannot be made domestically in China. And even those consumables are often degradable, meaning one can only stockpile so much. And I was kind of, at first I think we were both like, well what consumers can't you stockpile? And the answer to that is kind of neon gases and photogenic materials that are used in the manufacture of semiconductors. But then our next question was like why the hell can't China make their own neon gases or noble gases for the purposes of manufacturing semiconductors, that seems like something that they could be on top of.

B (59:20)

Yeah, so that's totally. That is exactly correct. The noble gases are not super manufacturable. They're not manufacturable. It's like a whole process. I will say that's only one part that's true of noble gases, but there's a bunch of types of gases, gases like neon gases and things like that, that actually are byproducts of steel manufacturing processes and other types of processes, except that they have to be insanely pure. Like those processes. Like those. Like, again, you're like, okay, China has no problem making steel, but it actually turns out that like, creating places that will basically be clean enough and pure enough to, to reliably give you very high quality neon gases or things like that that you need for, for these processes, they're just like a few places that do them really well. And there's never been a problem getting those gases from other places in the world. They are made by two companies, one in France, one in Germany, and companies in Korea and Japan. And those are where China had long standing and absolutely no like, reason to ever doubt that they would run. They would have issues getting those gases. So it'll be interesting to kind of see like, I mean, also, like, it's interesting always, I think, to hear Europe in play in the play and raw materials on anything ever. And so, like, it'll be interesting to see kind of how this plays out. But just, but just generally, I think that this is like part of, you know, this is part of a, to kind of Zoom way out for a second. This is part of a bigger geopolitical kind of conversation in which like, like China is going to do what they do best, which is manufacturing all the way down. But China has a lot of people and they do have a really reliable labor market and everything else. But they also like really are still super dependent on American content, even though a lot of it is illegal over there. And so I actually think that there's going to be this very high, low Internet stack kind of moment and brinksmanship is my long term thing that we'll see play out, which is like us has the content, they have the music, they have the culture, they have like a lot of the stuff, they have the platforms that deliver it. And China has like, you know, the rocks and like the raw materials. And it's going to be like rocks versus rock and roll is kind of like, kind of, I think really like a long term struggle. And somewhere in the middle is going to be Europe.

C (61:50)

It's like an absolutely fascinating development, if a little bit of a scary one. I mean, Dean Ball, who we should note, among other things, was the author of the Trump administration's AI plan, he was in the Office of Science and Technology Policy for like a hot three or four months. I met him the other day or a couple of weeks ago. And he's pointed out, he said, basically, like, I came in to write the plan that I left because I'm not the right guy to administer the plan, but I was the right guy to write the plan. And it's an interesting plan. I think, like, there are a lot of things that people like in the plan, even though people quibble with parts of it. The point he makes is like, this is a threat, not just if taken, applied strictly, these export controls could be a threat to the whole global economy. Because we are on the verge, we are frankly under a state of kind of false economic stimulus because we have so much money pouring into infrastructure for AI development, which suddenly, if all that is a bad investment because you can't get the chips or the materials to make the chips that you need, it will have big economic ramifications all over the place. Which I think tells you a little bit about something about the weird spot AI has come to play in our current economic moment, which is also is kind of telling. But you know, a key point I think is really interesting here is. And Ben or Mali, I would I welcome your thoughts on this. Like, how much is the Trump administration kind of to blame for this sort of of thing? By opening the trade war in the first place, because you would think there would be a reciprocal element. Traditionally, like all wars, you go for, there's an escalation ladder, right? Any sort of competition, and usually you go notch by notch, up by up. And I think everyone expected China to step up the escalation ladder on rare earths as strategic competition increased, as China and United States became more clearly economic rivals. Because it's really interesting for them to do this now because remember the Trump administration, it's actually like relaxed a lot of its chip constraints to some extent, right? Like they've opened the door for some more exports. So it's weird for them to be pulling this out about just that issue. Instead, it seems like this is a really big hammer because the whole war is much bigger. It's over the whole trade relationship. And we have to bear in mind there's meetings about that set to take place in just a few weeks. The timing of this does not seem like a coincidence. And notably these restrictions don't go into place until December, which is after those meetings. So maybe they never go into place if there's some sort of negotiated solution. But it's clearly, in my mind seems designed to put a lot of pressure. And it's not just about the chip restrictions because again, those have already been lightened. They've made some progress there. Even though it's clearly meant to be reminiscent in the structure of the export controls to UX export controls on chips. I don't think that's a coincidence. Coincidence. It doesn't seem like that's what they're aiming for. It seems like they're aiming for much bigger trade relationship. Does that sound right to you or am I off base?