Think Tank Quickies (#504)

• Russian hackers targeted former US Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer, a senior fellow at Brookings.
• Hidden camera video shows Project 2025 co-author discussing his secret work preparing for a second Trump term.
• Russia adds over 30 British think tank experts to its sanctions list.
• Hottest meeting for a lobbyist in DC: With think tank AFPI.
• The fake spy (Gaurav Srivastava) who dazzled DC and duped the Atlantic Council.
• Right-wing operatives from Washington, including the Heritage Foundation, are sharing pointers with German conservatives in Berlin.
  
• Conservative think tanks' embrace of Hungary's Viktor Orban.
• JD Vance championed 2017 report from the Heritage Foundation that proposed a sweeping conservative agenda to restrict sexual and reproductive freedoms and remake American families.
• NYT: Heritage spreads "deceptive" videos about non-citizen voters.
• Think tanks in China are the mainstay of "neican."  From 2018 to 2020, think tanks in China nearly tripled in number, from 507 to 1,413.  By the end of 2023 there were only 1,096.
  

Georgian Government Raids Homes of Atlantic Council Experts

Here is more from The Hill:

Georgian government officials raided the homes of local staff of an American think tank who work on tracking Russian disinformation, raising alarm among pro-democracy activists, civil society groups and some U.S. officials ahead of Georgia’s Oct. 26 parliamentary elections. 

Investigators targeted local staff in Tbilisi of the Atlantic Council, a think tank based in Washington, D.C., that is known for promoting democratic values and institutions, particularly in Eastern Europe.

The investigations unit of Georgia’s Finance Ministry searched the homes of Sopo Gelava and Eto Buziashvili, both staff members with the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Lab, known also as DFRLab. The two have authored reports on how Russia is carrying out overt and covert influence operations to sway the upcoming elections in favor of the ruling Georgian Dream party. 

 

Here is a statement from the Atlantic Council.

Think Tank Quickies (#503)

• More than 200 people appear on JD Vance's Venmo "friends" list.  Among them is Amalia Halikias, government relations director at the Heritage Foundation, as well as people affiliated with other conservative think tanks like the Hoover Institution and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).  Another one is Gladden Pappin, president of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs. 
• The Chinese Embassy in Washington has a team of 20 policy staffers responsible for election analysis, interacting with experts, think tanks, and journalists.
  
• Can a conservative think tank help save the Great Salt Lake?
• Bill Gates-led think tank (Breakthrough Energy) urges DOE revamp to boost clean tech.
• Role of think tanks in powering policy.
• The Peter G. Peterson asked 7 think tanks (AAF, AEI, BPC, CAP, EPI, PPI, and Manhattan Institute) to submit detailed plans for putting US debt back on a sustainable trajectory.
• Martin Indyk, a former US ambassador to Israel and the founding executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), died.
• Heritage Foundation is pushing the next US president to go all-in on deterring China in the Pacific.
• Some of JD Vance's strongest relationships in DC are with conservative think tanks and organizations influential on the so-called New Right, like the populist think tank American Compass and its chief economist Oren Cass; the nonprofit public service group American Moment; and the Heritage Foundation.
• What the government and think tanks are planning and why.