International Security & Defense

“It was too quiet.”

That was the sentiment expressed by a number of the 45 election officials from 23 states who gathered earlier this month at Harvard for a Belfer Center Defending Digital Democracy (D3P) Midterm After-Action Conference to discuss problems around their November midterm elections.  Most said they experienced significant but mostly unintended misinformation – and some disinformation – along with a number of other challenges to their electoral processes, but not the extensive foreign cyber and other attacks that took place during the 2016 presidential election.

I count myself among the skeptics concerning John Brennan’s organizational changes at the CIA, but such concerns have no bearing on the revocation of his clearances of other prominent national security officials. I signed the letter by former CIA officials repudiating the president’s actions because I am convinced that our nation is in a crisis. 

Donald Trump would have been an active target of Russian intelligence since the moment they laid eyes on him for two reasons that come straight from the classical espionage textbook: He has influence; and he is potentially vulnerable to various forms of compromise.

Nicholas Burns talks with MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell about claims by a Russian oligarch jailed by President Putin that Putin is paranoid and the future of Russia's leader. 

Nick Burns talks with Andrea Mitchell about additional revelations about Russia's use of social media (Twitter, Facebook) to influence outcome of 2016 U.S. Presidential election. 

After their bilateral summit at the G-20 meeting in Germany earlier this month, President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin had another encounter — one that was previously undisclosed and reportedly went on for an hour. The two leaders were joined only by Putin's own interpreter, which Ian Bremmer, president of political risk consultancy Eurasia Group, called a "breach of national security protocol."

Here & Now's Lisa Mullins talks with Professor Nicholas Burns (@rnicholasburns) about the meeting.

Nicholas Burns talks to CNN's New Day about Trump's undisclosed second meeting with Vladimir Putin at the G-20 meeting. "You have to show Putin where he can't go. And President Trump has not done that."

After President Trump sat down with Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 7 for a highly anticipated meeting at the G20 summit in Hamburg, he met with Putin a second time for a lengthy meeting, that was unattended by advisors and previously undisclosed. Nick Burns talks with PBS NewsHour on why this is significant. 

Donald Trump Jr. is seeking to write off as a nonevent his meeting last year with a Russian lawyer who was said to have damaging information about Hillary Clinton. “It was such a nothing,” he told Fox News’s Sean Hannity on Tuesday. “There was nothing to tell.”

Donald Trump came home from Europe feeling pretty good... until his eldest son began raining on his parade. Donald Trump, Jr., tweeted four pages of emails describing how a meeting with a Russian lawyer who promised incriminating information on Hillary Clinton came to be.

The meeting was facilitated by Rob Goldstone - a publicist with ties to the Trump family - and eventually took place at Trump Tower with Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner and then-campaign chair Paul Manafort included.

In light of the developments, former U.S. ambassador to NATO Nicholas Burns joined Jim Braude to survey the president's international standing.