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.