Think Tank Quickies (#498)

• Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) is joining the Hudson Institute as a distinguished fellow; Nikki Halley makes her inaugural appearance as Walter P. Stern Chair at Hudson. 
• Brian Deese (formerly at CAP), Richard Bush (Brookings), Laura Rosenberger (CNAS and GMF), and Richard Armitage (CSIS) sent as delegation to Taiwan's presidential inauguration.
  
• A "startling new study" by RAND that was commissioned by the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment.
  
• Those attending the McCain Institute's annual Sedona Forum include: Antony Blinken, Janet Yellen, Mitt Romney, and Dasha Navalnaya. 
• Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who served as chief of staff to VP Dick Cheney and as senior vice president at the Hudson Institute, is joining the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) as a distinguished fellow.
  
• "The Zachor Legal Institute, a legal think tank representing StopAntisemitism."
• The role of think tanks under China's Xi Jinping, via MERICS.
  
• Why foundations that back progressives are funding a leading conservative think tank.
• Jennifer Gould named VP of Communications and External Affairs at RAND Corp.
• The think tank laying the groundwork for a Labour government in the UK.
  

Pro-Trump Think Tank Paid Millions to Companies Tied to Its Own Leaders

Here is more from the New York Times:

The Conservative Partnership Institute, a nonprofit whose funding skyrocketed after it became a nerve center for President Donald J. Trump’s allies in Washington, has paid at least $3.2 million since the start of 2021 to corporations led by its own leaders or their relatives, records show.

One was led by the institute’s president, Edward Corrigan, and another by its chief operating officer. At a third contractor, the board members included the group’s senior legal fellow Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer who supported Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

 

The Conservative Partnership Institute (CPI) was founded in 2017 by former US Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC), after he was ousted as President of the Heritage Foundation.

Think Tanks Targeted in Latest North Korean Email-Based Cyberattacks

Here is more from UPI:

North Korean hackers are exploiting an email security flaw in attacks used to gather sensitive intelligence and information, a new U.S. cybersecurity advisory warned.

The advisory, issued Thursday by the FBI, State Department and National Security Agency, said that members of the Pyongyang-backed hacking collective Kimsuky are sending spearphishing emails to individuals at think tanks, academic institutions and media organizations.

In one example, a hacker pretending to be a think tank staffer invited a U.S. government official to give a keynote address at a conference on North Korea. In another, a Kimsuky agent posed as a journalist seeking comment on geopolitical issues related to North Korea. 

Kimsuky is believed to operate under the North's premier military intelligence organization, the Reconnaissance General Bureau. The hacker group is also known as Emerald Sleet, Thallium and Velvet Chollima by private-sector cybersecurity researchers.

 

There is no word yet on which think tanks have been impacted. 

Also, Iranian-backed cyber spies are are continuing to impersonate think tanks.

Think Tank Accidentally Exposes Personal Info. From Job Applicants

Here is more from the Washington Free Beacon:

The right-wing group that leads a recruitment effort for Capitol Hill offices and allied nonprofits, the Conservative Partnership Institute (CPI), has for months left exposed the sensitive personal information of applicants to its online "jobs bank," the Washington Free Beacon found, including members of the U.S. intelligence community, congressional aides, former Trump administration officials, and campaign operatives.

Led by former Heritage Foundation president Jim DeMint and one of his former aides, Ed Corrigan, as well as by former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows, who the New York Times reported is paid $847,000 to serve as the organization's "senior partner," the Conservative Partnership Institute has exposed the social security numbers, home addresses, private client names, and other personal details of over 1,500 job applicants, including several who hold the highest level security clearance—known as a top secret/sensitive compartmented information (TS/SCI) clearance—in a public online storage system on an Amazon cloud. With basic web-scraping software, the records can be viewed by anyone, including America’s foreign adversaries.

 

The news site notes that the records were stored in open Amazon S3 buckets, which are publicly accessible unless the owner takes steps to make them private.

New Think Tank Quickies (#497)

• Eric Schmidt-backed pro-America "think tank" (America's Frontier Fund) has launched a VC firm.
• New report from Special Competitive Studies Project, an Eric Schmidt-backed think tank, says the US intelligence community "risks surprise, intelligence failure, and even attrition of its importance" unless it embraces AI's capacity to process huge amounts of data. 
• Donald Abelson: Rethinking the Role and Influence of US Defense and Foreign Policy Think Tanks.
• Steven Bennett, previously the COO of Brookings, will be CFR's new EVP and chief administrative officer.
• Luxe membership club Ned to open within a six-building DC complex owned by the Milken Institute, which plans to open the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream next year.
  
• "A new global think tank - the merger of the International House of Japan (I-House) established by John D. Rockefeller III to repair US-Japan ties after WWII and the Asia Pacific Initiative, set up by Yoichi Funabashi, the former newspaper editor, author and national security expert."
• Gordon Gray is launching the Pinpoint Policy Institute to advocate for free markets and policies that promote economic growth.  He was most recently VP for economic policy at the American Action Forum (AAF). 
• The Roosevelt Institute has hired Elly Kugler as managing director for government relations and Hannah Groch-Begley to serve as director of the think tank.
• Did China just go after a powerful Aussie think tank?
  
• The man (Mohammed Soliman) whispering the Middle East's future into Washington's ear.
  

Third Way's Secret Battle to Stop No Labels

Here is more from NBC:

Once upon a time, before the multimillion-dollar negative campaigns and allegations of running “a conspiracy to commit extortion, voter intimidation, and other criminal behavior,” they were friends. Good friends.

The people who run No Labels and Third Way, two of the most prominent centrist organizations in Washington, had all come up together in the small world of Clinton-era center-left politics.

Nancy Jacobson, an early Bill Clinton hire and the founder of No Labels, helped raise the initial money and secure the necessary political blessings to start Third Way. The think tank was co-founded by Jon Cowan, whom Jacobson viewed as something of a mentee. Cowan, now Third Way's president, even signed the ketubah (the Jewish wedding contract) at Jacobson's wedding to Mark Penn, whose firm conducts No Labels’ polls.

Then came the 2024 election — and No Labels’ decision to try to field a bipartisan “unity ticket” against both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, backed by a reported budget of $70 million. Third Way, which may be centrist but is firmly Democratic, viewed this as a misguided, no-hope effort that could only spoil the election for Biden and help to re-elect Trump, with potentially disastrous consequences.

 

The article notes that No Labels was so incensed by the anti-No Labels campaign that the group lodged a complaint the the US Justice Department, accusing them of violating anti-racketeering laws.

It also says that Third Way lost a board member who sided with No Labels, and its leaders received word from several unhappy donors that they should not expect any more funding.

"Alpha Male" Nick Adams Creating Awkward Moment for Wilson Center Board

Here is more from the Washington Post about conservative political commentator and author Nick Adams:

He [Nick Adams] is a presidential appointee to the board of Washington’s Woodrow Wilson Center, which, according to its website, “provides nonpartisan counsel and insights on global affairs to policymakers.” Donald Trump, who bestowed him with that honor during his last term, has recently made Adams an official campaign surrogate as the former president attempts to regain control of the White House.

At the Wilson Center, Adams is known as a quiet presence, attending board meetings regularly but speaking so little that some people didn’t even know he had an Australian accent. He is an active member, even traveling on a Wilson Center trip to Israel last year, where he participated in a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

There are members of the center’s staff, “especially young women,” who think his presence on the board is an “embarrassment” and “may be also be damaging our reputation,” according to a Wilson Center employee who would speak openly about a current board member only on the condition of anonymity.

After I started making inquiries about Adams with people who worked at the Wilson Center, the director, Mark Green, tried to allay any concerns among the staff about the Alpha Male in their midst.

A lot of politics can be performative, Green told other staffers during a regularly scheduled meeting, according to multiple people present. The center’s official response to my interest in Adams was prim: “Nick is a member of the board in good standing and regularly attends board meetings,” it said in a statement. “Beyond that, the Wilson Center’s policy is to not comment on board members and their activities.”

The Wilson Center may have good reason to want to remain in good standing with Adams. Because the center needs Congress and the president to approve federal funding to support operating costs, he may be its best ally if Trump’s GOP takes control of Washington next year.

 

Here is a full list of the Wilson Center's board of trustees, and here is Adams' official appointment announcement by Mr. Trump.

Adani Group to Fund Public Policy Think Tank

Here is more from The Economic Times:

Gautam Adani-led Adani Group plans to set up a think tank that will aid policy thinking in three critical areas - energy transition and climate change, economics and trade, and geopolitics and strategic affairs, according to people familiar with the development, who said the unit might be kicked off as early as May.  The think tank will be called Chintan Research Foundation and will be incubated with an initial funding of ₹100 crore.

The move pitches the infrastructure conglomerate in direct competition with RIL-backed Observer Research Foundation, or ORF, a think tank that took shape in 1990.  ORF, based in New Delhi, has emerged in recent years as one of India's most high-profile think tanks.

In collaboration with the Ministry of External Affairs, ORF organizes the Raisina Dialogue, India's flagship conference on geopolitics and geoeconomics.

Screening and interviews are underway for a chairperson, members of advisory board, and research staff for the foundation, which will be headquartered in New Delhi.  Outposts in Washington and London are part of the plan.

 

Gautam Adani is currently worth $103 billion, while Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) chairman Mukesh Ambani is worth $113 billion, according to Bloomberg.

Gautam Adani-led Adani Group plans to set up a think tank that will aid policy thinking in three critical areas - energy transition and climate change, economics and trade, and geopolitics and strategic affairs, according to people familiar with the development, who said the unit might be kicked off as early as May. The think tank will be called Chintan Research Foundation and will be incubated with an initial funding of ₹100 crore.

Read more at:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/company/corporate-trends/after-museum-gallery-adani-group-to-fund-policy-thinktank/articleshow/109205076.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

 

Gautam Adani-led Adani Group plans to set up a think tank that will aid policy thinking in three critical areas - energy transition and climate change, economics and trade, and geopolitics and strategic affairs, according to people familiar with the development, who said the unit might be kicked off as early as May. The think tank will be called Chintan Research Foundation and will be incubated with an initial funding of ₹100 crore.

Read more at:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/company/corporate-trends/after-museum-gallery-adani-group-to-fund-policy-thinktank/articleshow/109205076.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

Gautam Adani-led Adani Group plans to set up a think tank that will aid policy thinking in three critical areas - energy transition and climate change, economics and trade, and geopolitics and strategic affairs, according to people familiar with the development, who said the unit might be kicked off as early as May. The think tank will be called Chintan Research Foundation and will be incubated with an initial funding of ₹100 crore.

Read more at:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/company/corporate-trends/after-museum-gallery-adani-group-to-fund-policy-thinktank/articleshow/109205076.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

Heritage Foundation Handpicked by NATO Chief for Major Speech

Here is more from CNN:

When NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg visited Washington in January, he gave a speech on the future of NATO at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that is a bastion of the Republican foreign policy establish in Washington.

The location was handpicked by Stoltenberg’s team, an effort to reach out to Republicans given the possibility of Trump winning in November and amid concerns about his commitment to NATO, explained sources familiar with the planning.

The speech, which emphasized the collective strength of NATO ahead of its 75^th anniversary this summer, was well-received, the sources said.

“The logic of doing it at Heritage was not lost on us,” said Victoria Coates, a deputy national security advisor to former President Trump who is now a vice president at the think tank.

 

Here is a full transcript of the Heritage speech.

Think Tank Quickes (#496)

• House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chair James Comer (R-KY) asks NGOs, including Open Markets Institute, New America, and the Center for Digital Democracy, to preserve communications with USTR related to the agency's decision to rethink its digital trade stance.
  
• The Hewlett Foundation and Omidyar Network, a pair of left-leaning philanthropies that aim to see a "post-neoliberal" economic consensus, have collectively invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in the think tank American Compass. 
• The Palantir Foundation for Defense Policies & International Affairs to hold inaugural conference in Washington, DC on May 16.
  
• CFR launches RealEcon to reimagine American economic leadership.
  
• Liberal watchdog group Accountable.US launches new campaign to target Heritage Foundation's Project 2025. 
• Quincy Institute on FDD: "Why No One Should Take This Hawkish Think Tank Seriously."
• Capital Research Center: "A right-wing investigative think tank that has portrayed American Compass as a puppet of progressive philanthropists."
• The People's Policy Project, a left-wing think tank founded by Matt Bruenig. [The only think tank funded by tiny monthly donations.]
  
• CFR tapped Millie Tran, previously at Conde Nast, as vice president and chief digital content officer.
• Meredith Sumpter, wife of Brookings China scholar Ryan Hass, to become President and CEO of FairVote.

Nikki Haley Joins Hudson Institute

Here is more from a Hudson press release:

Hudson Institute today announced that Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and US ambassador to the United Nations, will be the next Walter P. Stern Chair.

Hudson inaugurated the Walter P. Stern Chair in 2020 to commemorate the achievements of former Chairman Walter “Wally” Stern, who was instrumental in making Hudson one of Washington’s most respected research organizations.

Haley received Hudson’s Global Leadership Award in 2018.

 

Hudson had revenues of around $22 million in 2022, with 39% coming from individuals, 38% from foundations, 14% from corporations, and 9% from governments.  

Major donors that give $100,000 or more to the think tank include: All Nippon Airways (ANA), American Petroleum Institute (API), Amway, BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, META Platforms, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Northrup Grumman, Qualcomm, Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office (TECRO), and Walmart.

Heritage Foundation Hit With Cyberattack

Here is more from TechCrunch:

Conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation said on Friday that it experienced a cyberattack earlier this week.

A person with knowledge of the cyberattack told TechCrunch that efforts at Heritage were underway to remediate the cyberattack, but said that it wasn’t immediately known what, if any, data was taken.

Politico, which first reported the news of the cyberattack on Friday, cited a Heritage official as saying the organization “shut down its network to prevent any further malicious activity while we investigate the incident.”

The news outlet quoted the Heritage official as saying that the cyberattack likely came from nation-state hackers, but did not provide evidence of the claim.

 

TechCrunch notes that the Heritage Foundation was hit by a cyberattack in 2015 in which hackers stole internal emails and and the personal information of its donors.

Little-Known Australian Think Tanker is "The China Whisperer"

Here is s short clip from The Wire China:

Garnaut Global is, in many ways, a typical “strategic consultancy” firm: For decades, former government officials like Pottinger and Garnaut have cashed in by serving as political or regulatory advisors for the private sector. Attempting to read the tea leaves of open-source Chinese Communist Party (CCP) texts, meanwhile, is commonplace in think tanks and academia. But Garnaut has married the two approaches in a kind of Moneyball style, and his clients praise his unique ability to translate deep readings of Marxist ideology into actionable advice.

Garnaut also enjoys special status in the current moment of Western-China relations, because he is one of the men most responsible for bringing the current moment about. Although he was very much a child of the “engagement” era, Garnaut, 49, was one of the first “China watchers” to call foul and argue that a new era was upon us.

 

The firm was founded by John Garnaut, a former journalist-cum-Australian official.  Garnaut was a Senior Fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI).

Matthew Pottinger, a former US deputy national security advisor, is also a part of the firm.  He is a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Chairman of the China Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD).  He's also a Senior Advisor at The Marathon Initiative.

Think Tank Quickies (#495)

• ECFR launches DC office.
  
• TikTok has think tank friends.
  
• Trump threatens to kick out "nasty" Australian Ambassador Kevin Rudd, a former PM and think tanker who's been critical of Trump, if he returns to the White House.
• Ukrainian, British think tanks expose supplies of raw materials to Russia for ammo production.
  
• The global elite just gathered at a secretive mini Davos. Meet Global.Minds.
  
• Billy Pizer will be the next president and CEO of Resources for the Future (RFF).
• Rush Doshi and Sue Mi Terry (formerly as the Wilson Center) joined CFR as fellows.
  
• Biden Labor Dept. relies on union-funded think tanks to push pro-union agenda.
• New York think tank taps Martin Kimani, Kenya's outgoing Permanent Representative to the UN, to build bridges of justice.
• DoD: "Table of Knowledge acts as think tank for Project Convergence Capstone 4."

Trump's Secret Plan to End the Ukraine War Hatched at Think Tank Event?

Here is more from the Washington Post:

Former president Donald Trump has privately said he could end Russia’s war in Ukraine by pressuring Ukraine to give up some territory, according to people familiar with the plan. Some foreign policy experts said Trump’s idea would reward Russian President Vladimir Putin and condone the violation of internationally recognized borders by force.

Word of Trump’s plan for Ukraine circulated in Washington last November at a meeting at the Heritage Foundation between right-of-center foreign policy figures and a visiting delegation from the European Council on Foreign Relations. Former Trump White House aide Michael Anton described the expected contours of Trump’s peace plan as Ukraine ceding territory in Crimea and Donbas, limiting NATO expansion and enticing Putin to loosen his growing reliance on China, according to multiple people present for the meeting, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private discussion.

 

WaPo notes that James Carafano, a Heritage fellow and senior counselor to the think tank's president, convened the meeting.  Meanwhile, Jeremy Shapiro, head of the Washington office of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), brought the group's delegation to the November meeting.

Michael Anton is a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute.

How a Right-Wing Texas Think Tank Ducked Property Taxes

Here is more from Texas Monthly:

The Texas Public Policy Foundation, a right-wing think tank with ties to the state’s most powerful politicians and political donors, has long lobbied legislators to abolish property taxes. So far, this effort has failed. But TPPF has succeeded in another ambitious goal: ducking its own property taxes.

For the past decade, Texas Monthly has learned, the think tank hasn’t paid a single dollar in taxes on its lavish, limestone-fronted, six-story headquarters, just two blocks from the Capitol in downtown Austin. The building’s appraised value is $18 million. How did TPPF manage this feat? 

Under state law, exemption from property taxes is reserved only for some nonprofit organizations, including orphan-aid groups and animal shelters. A well-funded think tank that promotes the interests of the oil-and-gas industry and undermines support for public schools, among other causes, would not seem to qualify. Indeed, TPPF was twice denied an exemption. But it persisted by appealing to the comptroller’s office, the statewide tax agency.

 

The article notes that TPPF, which has an annual budget of around $21.5 million and 150 staffers, has so far avoided paying around $3 million in taxes on its headquarters.

TPPF's former CEO, Brooke Rollins, now runs America First Policy Institute (AFPI).  Another former TPPF CEO, Kevin Roberts, now runs the Heritage Foundation.

How Billionaire Megadonors Use Think Tanks

Here is more from CNN:

When Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft jumped into the state’s gubernatorial race last year, the Republican vowed to tackle a slew of culture war issues, promising to fight the “woke politics” of “left-wing” banks and touting how he used his position to enact a regulation targeting those financial firms.

Ashcroft also said candidates shouldn’t focus on issues that let the one percent “force their beliefs on 99 percent of the population.”

While Ashcroft positioned himself as a champion for working class voters, emails obtained by CNN and the progressive watchdog group Documented show that he was steered toward adopting his “anti-woke” investment regulation by a little-known, right-wing think tank with deep ties to conservative billionaires. The communications show that officials with the Foundation for Government Accountability suggested regulatory language to Ashcroft and even wrote an op-ed article that Ashcroft published in a national conservative magazine under his own name. 

The emails not only reveal FGA’s influence over Ashcroft, they offer a snapshot of the group’s growing influence across the country, particularly in red states. And that influence can carry a high cost for workers and taxpayers. 

The group’s communications with Ashcroft...give a rare glimpse into how billionaire megadonors use think tanks like FGA to advance their causes out of public view. Federal tax laws allow such donors to channel millions of dollars anonymously, through nonprofit foundations, to activist organizations that lobby for and work behind the scenes to enact legislation that reflects partisan political goals. 

 

CNN notes that even though FGA's tax exempt status requires it not to engage in "substantial" lobbying, the group has closely coordinated with a variety of state officials and legislators to advance their causes. 

The Heritage Foundation is one of the many allies of FGA, and it is one of the 100+ coalition partners on Heritage's Project 2025.

FGA, based in Naples, Florida, was founded in 2011 by Tarren Bragdon, a former Maine legislator and past CEO of the free-market think tank Maine Heritage Policy Center.

Major FGA donors include the Sarah Scaife Foundation, the Searle Freedom Trust, Donors Trust, the Ed Uihlein Family Foundation, the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, and The 85 Fund, a nonprofit connected to conservative legal activist Leonard Leo.

Think Tank Quickies (#494)

• Heritage Foundation raised a record-breaking $150 million in 2023. 
• Heritage announces formation of National Task Force to Combat Antisemitism.
• Heritage Foundation's Oversight Project sues DHS for targeting the think tank.
• Former AEI president Christopher DeMuth becomes Distinguished Fellow at Heritage.
• Former ODNI Director John Ratcliffe becomes Visiting Fellow at Heritage.
  
• What are think tanks thinking about EU defense issues?
• Event: How can think tanks make themselves heard in the election campaign?
• Wilson Center launches Indo-Pacific program.
• Meet Cecilia Rouse, new Brookings president; official announcement from 2023.
  
• Brookings appointed Colin Kahl as the Sydney Stein, Jr. Scholar in Foreign Policy.
• Brookings launches Center for Economic Security and Opportunity.
• Brookings unveils new website.
  

Report Attacking Nippon Steel Tied to Think Tank Pair

In a bid to sink Nippon Steel's acquisition of US Steel, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) recently used a report from a pair of think tankers to urge the White House to investigate Nippon's ties to China.

Brown reportedly raised those concerns based on a report by consultancy Horizon Advisory.  Brown sent Horizon's report to President Biden.

Horizon Advisory was co-founded by two senior fellows at the hawkish think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD): Nathan Picarsic and Emily de La Bruyere.  

FDD was founded in 2001 by Clifford May, who writes a weekly "Foreign Desk" column for The Washington Times.  Its sister lobbying arm, FDD Action, was founded in 2019.  FDD has close ties to Israel and Gulf Arab states. 

In 2022, Horizon published a report on forced labor risks in China's aluminum sector.  In 2021 it published a pair of reports on China's industrial policy for the automotive sector as well as steel sector.  In 2020 it published a report on the so-called "China Standards 2035" strategy.

This year it published a report on China's dominance in the global solar market, which received praise from a number of anti-China groups, including the Coalition for a Prosperous America (CPA).

Think Tanks Unearth Efforts by China to Influence US Election

Here is more from the New York Times:

Covert Chinese accounts are masquerading online as American supporters of former President Donald J. Trump, promoting conspiracy theories, stoking domestic divisions and attacking President Biden ahead of the election in November, according to researchers and government officials.

The accounts signal a potential tactical shift in how Beijing aims to influence American politics, with more of a willingness to target specific candidates and parties, including Mr. Biden.

“I’ve never seen anything along those lines at all before,” said Elise Thomas, a senior analyst at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a nonprofit research organization that uncovered a small group of the fake accounts posing as Trump supporters.

Ms. Thomas and other researchers have linked the new activity to a long-running network of accounts connected with the Chinese government known as Spamouflage. Several of the accounts they detailed previously posted pro-Beijing content in Mandarin — only to resurface in recent months under the guise of real Americans writing in English.

In a separate project, the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a research organization in Washington, identified 170 inauthentic pages and accounts on Facebook that have also pushed anti-American messages, including pointed attacks on Mr. Biden.

 

The Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) is a London-based think tank specializing in combating alleged online disinformation.  Here is its recent report on Spamouflage.

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) is a Washington, DC-based think tank focusing on national security and foreign policy.

The Think Tanker Trying to Destroy TikTok

Here is more from The Intercept:

Among the many hawks on Capitol Hill, few have as effectively frightened lawmakers over Chinese control of TikTok as Jacob Helberg, a member of the U.S.–China Economic and Security Review Commission. Helberg’s day job at the military contractor Palantir, however, means he stands to benefit from ever-frostier relations between the two countries.

Helberg has been instrumental in the renewed legislative fight against TikTok, according to the Wall Street Journal. “Spearheading the effort to create the bipartisan, bicoastal alliance of China hawks is Jacob Helberg,” the Journal reported in March 2023. The paper noted collaboration between Helberg, previously a policy adviser at Google, and investor and fellow outspoken China hawk Peter Thiel, as well as others in Thiel’s circle. The anti-China coalition, the Journal reported this past week, has been hammering away at a TikTok ban, and Helberg said he has spoken to over 100 members of Congress about the video-sharing social media app.

At a February 2023 panel event, a representative of America’s Frontier Fund, a national security-oriented technology investment fund that pools private capital and federal dollars, said that a war between China and Taiwan would boost the firm’s profits by an order of magnitude. Private sector contributors to America’s Frontier Fund include both Thiel and former Google chair Eric Schmidt, whose China alarmism and defense-spending boosterism rivals Thiel’s — and who similarly stands to personally profit from escalations with China.

 

Helberg is an Adjunct Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and an Adjunct Senior Fellow for the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS).  He is also co-chairing the Brookings Institution China Strategy Working Group, as well as that think tank's US-France Working Group on China, according to his personal website.

House Select Committee on China Chairman Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) has worked closely with Helberg in recent months as part of the effort to ban TikTok from operating in the US while under Chinese ownership.  Gallagher is leaving Congress to take a job at Palantir.

A leading member of Gallagher's "personal brain trust" is Matthew Turpin, a senior adviser at Palantir.  Turpin is a Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution.

Think Tank Quickies (#493)

• Self-described independent think tank Caspian Policy Center quietly backs Central Asian governments, in particular Azerbaijan. 
• Conservative Partnership Institute (CPI) described by NYT as a "nerve center for the right wing."
  
• France's DGRIS international relations directorate audited as it revamps think tank.
• "The Centre for Policy Research (CPR), a think tank in Delhi, drafted many of the policies that have made India a laboratory of anti-poverty schemes.  Since coming into power in 2014, Narendra Modi's administration has shut down thousands of [NGOs].  CPR, which produced over 600 articles in 2022-2023, has laid off all but a handful of its 200 researchers and may not survive."
  
• The group American Commitment: "Designed to fill the capabilities gap between think tanks engaged in pure public policy work and grassroots organizations engaged in mobilizing citizen activists."
• Artomatic will take over the former Urban Institute headquarters in Washington, DC.
  
• Centennial Institute: "Colorado Christian University's think tank, mobilizing ideas on faith, family, and freedom to strengthen America's future."
• Institute for Progress (IFP): "A think tank for accelerating scientific, technological, and industrial progress." 
• Is China outpacing the US defense industrial base?  (via CSIS)
  
• Flashback: Is the Asia Foundation a front for the CIA?

Conflict Resolution Think Tank Hires Lobbyist for FARA Fight

Here is more from Politico:

NGO HIRES MERCURY: A conflict resolution think tank that three House Republicans accused of potentially acting as an unregistered foreign agent last month has boosted its presence in Washington as it pushes back against the criticism.

— International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based NGO, retained Mercury Government Affairs earlier this month for help “introducing the organization to policymakers” and talking the organization up as a “trusted resource on foreign relations matters,” according to a disclosure filing.

— Patrick Costello, the head of Mercury’s NGO and think tank practice and former chief executive of the national security think tank American Security Project, will work on the account for Mercury, according to the filing. It’s the first time the group has reported lobbying Washington since 2015, per a PI analysis of disclosures.

— At the beginning of February, Reps. Jim Banks (R-Ind.), Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) and Michael Waltz (R-Fla.) wrote a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland to request an investigation into whether International Crisis Group’s ties to Iranian groups — around the time that Crisis Group was lobbying on the Iran nuclear deal — had violated FARA.

— The lawmakers cited reporting from Semafor about an agreement the group had struck with a think tank run out of Iran’s foreign ministry to work together on research. Months earlier, Semafor had reported that Crisis Group researchers “were involved in an Iranian-backed research group … which Tehran hoped to use to advance its positions on the nuclear issue beginning in 2014.”

 

Costello was hired by Mercury in 2022 to lead the firm's NGO/Think Tank engagement practice.  Costello spent more than a decade at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), including as director of its Washington External Affairs.  He is a Life Member at CFR.  In 2021, he became the CEO of American Security Project (ASP).

Taiwan Gets Slew of Think Tank Delegations

A number of think tank delegations have been visiting Taiwan in recent weeks, as the US says that all signs suggest that China is sticking with its ambitions to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027.

On March 11, President Tsai Ing-wen received a delegation of think tankers from Washington, DC.  That group, led by Bonnie Glaser, Managing Director of the German Marshall Fund's Indo-Pacific program, included American Enterprise Institute (AEI) Senior Fellow Zack Cooper and Jude Blanchette, Freeman Chair in China Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).  It also included Rick Waters of Eurasia Group.

Blanchette recently co-wrote a piece for CSIS along with Brookings Institution scholar Ryan Hass and CSIS scholar Lily McElwee entitled "Building International Support for Taiwan."  That report was sponsored by the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the United States (TECRO).

The next day, Tsai received a delegation from the Center for American Progress (CAP), led by Tom Daschle, chair of CAP's board of directors.  Daschle is the Founder and CEO of The Daschle Group (TDG), which has a $25,000 per month contract with TECRO.  In that contract, TDG says it will help TECRO and the administration in Taipei with outreach to think tanks and others.  TDG is a public policy advisory of Baker Donelson.

Meanwhile, a delegation from the US Naval War College recently visited Taiwan, holding a joint seminar with the Institute for National Defense and Security Research (INDSR), a military-backed think tank in Taipei.  The two sides reportedly discussed China's People's Liberation Army and its Navy.  The CEO of INDSR recently participated in a CSIS event on Taiwan.

Scholars have noted that Taiwan's absence of diplomatic relations with most countries means that think tanks play an increasingly important role in bringing Taiwan closer to other countries.

Here is a 2020 piece from Eli Clifton entitled "Taiwan Funding of Think Tanks: Omnipresent And Rarely Disclosed."  China's media often comments on the flood of Taiwanese money going to US think tanks.

How the Heritage Foundation Came to Love Viktor Orban

Here is more from a piece by Casey Michel entitled "How Viktor Orban Conquered the Heritage Foundation":

But there was one other meeting that [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orbán took while in the U.S. that hasn’t received enough attention—and points directly to how Orbán has cultivated American conservatives to his cause and created a beachhead for Hungarian influence in Washington. On Friday, he spoke at a closed-door meeting at the Heritage Foundation’s headquarters in the nation’s capital. Joined by Heritage president Kevin Roberts and failed presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, Orbán spoke, according to a readout, in front of an audience that “included renowned U.S. right-wing politicians, analysts and public personalities.”

The event was, on paper, a somewhat dull affair, with Orbán covering matters ranging from Hungary’s “conservative family and economic policies” to the state of the war in Ukraine. Pulling back, however, the talk was nothing short of shocking. Instead of meeting with the White House, Orbán traveled to Washington to sit with the leadership of a think tank, using them as a platform to access and influence conservative Americans about both foreign and domestic policy. 

All of which leads to one question: How, and why, did the Heritage Foundation become the go-to vehicle for Budapest’s budding autocracy to target Americans?

The answer follows several different tracks. On the one hand, Hungary has been shedding lobbying outfits for the past few years, dropping a range of P.R. shops and Twitter influencers to focus solely on Heritage. On the other hand, internal transformations at Heritage—and a willingness to shred its reputation as a bastion of Reaganite, and even democratic, credentials—led the think tank’s leadership directly into Orbán’s lap, allowing it to become little more than a mouthpiece for a strongman and a leading proponent for Orbán-style rule in the U.S.

 

The article notes that the Heritage Foundation has finalized a cooperation agreement with the Danube Institute, a Hungarian think tank that praises Orban's government.

The Danube Institute is currently being run by John O'Sullivan, a British conservative who once served as director of studies at Heritage.

Here is a previous Think Tank Watch piece mentioning the Danube Institute.

Think Tank Quickies (#492)

• Center for Renewing America preparing to infuse "Christian nationalism" in 2nd Trump term. 
• New RAND report warning: Most significant threat to US financial system is not an abrupt event akin to a "financial 9/11," but rather a slow and steady process, akin to "financial climate change."
  
• Rep. Lance Gooden (R-TX) introduced the Think Tank and Nonprofit Foreign Influence Disclosure Act (H.R. 7169). 
• Stimson Center's Matthew Burrows: "Nasty, Brutish, and Short: Scholars, Think Tanks, and Influence on Policymaking."
  
• CNAS event: Deep Dive into Think Tanks. 
• Niskanen Center warns of the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025.
• CCP is urging the Global Times to complain about a Hudson Institute video.
• Wargaming in Japan's policy think tanks.
  
• "As for the Chinese public, Zhu Junwei - director of American research at Grandview Institution, a Beijing think tank, and a former researcher in the People's Liberation Army - carried out an informal online survey to find out how they view the upcoming vote. About 60% preferred Trump."
  
• Flashback: Jake Sullivan married Margaret Goodlander, who was a Next Generation National Security Fellow at CNAS from 2011-2012.

McKinsey-Led Think Tank Helped Chinese Government Compete With US

Here is more from the Financial Times:

A McKinsey-led think-tank advised China to deepen co-operation between business and the military and push foreign companies out of sensitive industries as part of a project for the central government in 2015.

The recommendations in a book by the Urban China Initiative, commissioned by the Chinese government’s central planning agency, were among dozens of policies it proposed to boost the country’s technological prowess, according to a review of the work, which has not previously been reported in western media.

The UCI’s book — with a foreword by one of McKinsey’s most senior partners in China and drawing on work by McKinsey’s in-house research arm — formed part of the Chinese government’s research for its 13th Five-Year Plan covering 2016-20. The Five-Year Plan included the “Made in China 2025” policy that increased tensions between Beijing and Washington.

McKinsey shut down UCI in 2021 and has played down its relationship with the Chinese government since coming under political pressure in the US, where lawmakers have questioned if consulting in China conflicts with the firm’s work for the US Department of Defense.

 

In light of the FT reporting, Republican lawmakers are now calling for McKinsey to be banned from securing federal contracts.

Think Tank Quickies (#491)

• President Biden pays particular attention to - and has consulted with - former Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass.
• How Jake Sullivan launched "Bidenism" at Brookings. 
• Climate scientist Michael Mann wins million-dollar verdict against right-wing bloggers connected to CEI.
  
• Republican lawmakers are requesting the DOJ to open an investigation into the International Crisis Group to determine if it acted as an unregistered agent for the government of Iran.
  
• Japan's endeavors to connect to Donald Trump have included outreach by Japanese diplomats with think tanks.
• What the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies' wargame revealed about a key USAF concept.
• Williams Institute: "A UCLA Law think tank focused on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy."
• Last month, former CFR head Richard Haass approached top Biden Administration officials with an "audacious" plan for changing politics around the Israel-Hamas war: Distance Biden from Netanyahu by making his case directly to the Israeli people.
• The Carter Center has registered to lobby.
• Narrative Strategies says it's the "only think-and-do tank currently postured to deliver both operationalized narrative services and training at the most elite level."
  

Atlantic Council Axes Major Donor

Here is more from Politico:

The Atlantic Council terminated its relationship with a major donor, Gaurav Srivastava, after the think tank couldn’t confirm important details of his background in its donor vetting process, Daniel reports. Srivastava and his wife Sharon donated at least $1 million to the think tank for its Global Food Security Forum in Bali in November 2022.

— Srivastava last October was the subject of an unflattering profile by the news outlet Project Brazen that suggested misconduct on his part; a lawyer for Srivastava, who was granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record, told PI that the allegations in the article were “categorically false.” Bradley Hope, a co-author of the story and a former Wall Street Journal reporter, told PI in an email that “we stand by our story.” The termination of the relationship with the Atlantic Council has not been previously reported.

— “All funds received by the Atlantic Council from Mr. Srivastava for the Global Food Security Forum were dedicated to and used for the event,” a spokesperson for the Atlantic Council told PI. “We did, however, return funding received from Mr. Srivastava in 2023 for future collaboration.”

— “We made the decision to terminate our relationship with Mr. Srivastava in May 2023 upon learning new information because of our donor review process. For example, we learned that The Gaurav & Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation was not an established 501C3 in April of 2023, despite Mr. Srivastava’s representation to the Council that this was a registered foundation,” the spokesperson continued.

 

Here is a link to the Gaurav & Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation, which says it was founded in 2015.

The above-mentioned Project Brazen news outlet says that Gaurav Srivastava is an "alleged serial con man who pretended to be part of a little-known CIA program to swindle an oil trader."

Think Tank Used to Defeat Trump in 2020 is Relaunched

Here is more from Axios: 

Veterans of the Obama administration are re-launching an advocacy group, National Security Action, to make the case for President Biden's re-election based on his foreign policy, according to a memo obtained by Axios.

Driving the news: National Security Action was originally co-founded in 2018 by Jake Sullivan — now Biden's national security adviser — and Ben Rhodes, the former deputy national security adviser for Barack Obama.

Zoom out: The group's leaders didn't expect to get involved in campaigns after Biden beat Trump in 2020, but the former president's resurgence led them to try to get involved in the 2024 election.

 

Here is the website for National Security Action.