The “Techs Appeal” Edition

About this episode

This week, Scott sat down with his Lawfare colleagues Managing Editor Tyler McBrien and Senior Editors Anna Bower and Michael Feinberg to talk through the week’s big news in national security, including: • “Third Country’s the Charm.” On Tuesday, the Supreme Court cleared the way—for the third time—for the Trump administration to resume deporting migrants to “third countries” with which they have no connection, staying a lower court ruling that found the policy unlawful and agreeing to hear the case on the merits in December. The decision comes days after the administration quietly flew a group of Somali men—some with no criminal records, who had been held at Guantánamo Bay for a month after being told their plane was only stopping in Cuba to refuel—to Mogadishu, on a flight that departed hours after an appeals court made clear the third-country removal policy was blocked. It also comes as lower courts are increasingly finding the administration in contempt for violating their orders in deportation cases, and as the full D.C. Circuit weighs whether Judge James Boasberg can continue his contempt inquiry into last year’s Alien Enemies Act flights. What does this pattern tell us abou