Fmr. Intel Official: Abundance of Chinese Moles at US Think Tanks

Here is more from a SpyTalk interview:

The entire U.S. intelligence community—17 agencies in all—has been penetrated by Chinese spies, says Nicholas Eftimiades, who recently retired as one of the U.S. government’s top experts on Chinese espionage.

He added,  “I think if we're talking about [the] Justice [Department], the intelligence community, the 17 agencies including the DNI, I'd be stunned if there weren't dozens, absolutely stunned if there weren't dozens” of Chinese moles.

Eftimiades, who retired in 2017, quickly cautioned that probably only a small number—”less than a dozen”—have access to classified information.  Many more are employed to find out just “who's who” in U.S. intelligence, “and where they're living and things like that.” But Eftimiades, author of two books on Chinese espionage, said there are “thousands more” moles in other, non-intelligence U.S. government agencies, as well as among contractors, corporations, think tanks and congressional offices.

 

Here is list from Think Tank Watch of former US intelligence officials who have worked or still work at US think tanks.

Think Tank Quickies (#418)

• G7 works on steps to defend academic research with eye on China. 
• New Atlantic Council report finds that the US in 2020 had ore influence in 140 countries, while China had more influence in 61 countries.
  
• Tom Donohue of the US Chamber of Commerce rejoins Hudson Institute board of trustees.
• Research tool from ASPI tracks international expansion of 27 of China's major tech companies.
• Smith Richardson Foundation giving major money to numerous think tanks.
• The Mitchell Institute "is the only aerospace power-focused think tank in the nation's capital."
• New Chinese sanctions law formalizes the process for sanctioning think tanks or people who advised on foreign sanctions, according to Julian Ku.
• Flashbacks: Is science hitting a wall? (Part I and Part II); the decline of unfettered research.
• Ideas from CFR report on China's BRI co-authored by Jennifer Hillman included in G7 plan.
• Last summer, Patriotic Millionaires, a group of about 200 wealthy individuals including the Disney heiress Abigail Disney, joined the left-leaning Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) in asking Congress to double for the next 3 years the amount of assets private foundations are required to pay out, to 10%.

Patrick Gaspard Named as New Chief of Center for American Progress

Mr. Patrick Gaspard has been named as the new President and CEO of the think tank Center for American Progress (CAP), replacing Neera Tanden who has gone into the Biden Administration.  Gaspard will also be the CEO of the Center for American Progress Action Fund (CAPAF), the sister lobbying arm of CAP.

Here are some details from his biography:

Patrick Gaspard was a key figure in President Barack Obama’s administration and held a number of prominent positions during Obama’s two terms in office, including serving as U.S. ambassador to the Republic of South Africa in the second term.

From the fall 2011 until the spring 2013, Gaspard served as executive director of the Democratic National Committee, where he steered the national party’s role in reelecting the president and oversaw a $300 million budget and 500 staff.

From 2009 until 2011, he was assistant to the president and director of the White House Office of Political Affairs. He also served as the associate director of personnel for the Obama transition and the national political director for the historic 2008 campaign.

Gaspard most recently served as the president of the Open Society Foundations (OSF), one of the largest private philanthropies in the world.

Gaspard was born in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, to Haitian parents. He grew up in New York City and had a long career there and nationally in organized labor, electoral politics, and public service. He started as a union organizer and rose to become executive vice president for politics and legislation of the Local 1199 branch of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), one of the largest unions in the United States.

 

According to the latest tax records, Tanden had been making close to $400,000 annually working at the think tank.  She is now making around $180,000 working for the US government.

Here is a story on the announcement from Politico, which calls CAP "the most influential think tank" of the Biden era.  It cites some of CAP's "wins," including "shifting the tide of opinion against the Iraq War, helping lay the foundations for health care reform in the leadup to Obamacare's passage, innovating in the world of advocacy media, and feeding personnel to institutions throughout DC."

It notes that CAP along with CAPAF currently have a staff of 287 and an operating budget of $64 million for 2021.

According to Politico, CAP founder and board member John Podesta will remain at the think tank to help with the transition to a new leader, but he may leave in "a year or so."

Daughters of Biden Aides Connected to Think Tanks

The Biden Administration has scores of former think tankers on its team, and that includes the families of some of Biden's top aides.  Here is more from the Washington Post:

Steve Ricchetti’s daughter, Shannon Ricchetti, who graduated from college in 2016, is deputy associate director of the office of the White House social secretary, a job she secured after working at the Aspen Institute and on the Biden transition team. Bruce Reed, a deputy White House chief of staff and longtime Biden confidant, has a daughter, Julia Reed, who graduated college in 2015 and works as Biden’s day scheduler.

Cathy Russell, director of presidential personnel in the White House, has a daughter, Sarah Donilon, who graduated from college in 2019 and works on the White House National Security Council. Sarah Donilon’s uncle, Mike Donilon, is a senior adviser to Biden in the White House.

Sarah Donilon...worked as a McCain Institute fellow with Kurt Campbell, the National Security Council coordinator for the Indo Pacific, with whom she now works in the White House, the White House official said. 

 

Think Tank Watch has documented well over 100 think tankers who have gone into the Biden Administration.

H.R. McMaster Quits Atlantic Council Board Over Koch Funding

Here is more from The Washington Free Beacon:

H.R. McMaster, the retired general and former national security adviser, resigned in protest from the board of a Washington, D.C., think tank last month after expressing concern internally that funding from the billionaire Charles Koch was tainting the institution's scholarship.

McMaster, according to two sources familiar with the situation, was alarmed by the publication in March of an Atlantic Council report arguing that the promotion of human rights undercuts America's strategic interest. The report, authored by Emma Ashford and Matthew Burrows, was a product of an Atlantic Council project, the New American Engagement Initiative, funded by a $4.5 million grant from the Charles Koch foundation, according to a press release issued when the grant was announced.

The Atlantic Council has an enormous board of directors that includes retired public servants like George W. Bush national security adviser Stephen Hadley and Gen. David Petraeus; lobbyists like Sally Painter of Blue Star Strategies, who is now under federal investigation for her work for the corrupt Ukrainian gas giant Burisma; and Amir Handjani, a onetime foreign agent for Saudi Arabia's government-controlled investment fund.

 

The article notes that on June 22, Stephen Wertheim, a scholar at the Quincy Institute, announced his departure from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace's American Statecraft Program, funded earlier this year by a new Koch grant.

Here is more from Think Tank Watch about the Atlantic Council kerfuffle back in March.

While McMaster left Atlantic Council, he is still the holder of the Hudson Institute's Japan Chair and is also the Fouad and Michelle Ajami Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

Think Tank Quickies (#417)

• Centre for Long-Term Resilience issued a report called "Future Proof" making the case that "we are currently living with an unsustainably high level of extreme risk."
  
• Bush China Foundation received $5 million grant from China-United States Exchange Foundation (CUSEF).
• Ben Schreer appointed as Executive Director of IISS's new Berlin office.
• Foreign influence and think tanks at the witness table, via POGO.
  
• Is a nonprofit think tank job right for you? (via Harvard Business Review).
• 2020 flashback: CNAS CEO Richard Fontaine proposed a New Atlantic Charter for the post-COVID era.
  
• Hudson Institute's Rebeccah Heinrichs received hate mail after publishing piece on Chinese drones.
• EUISS: How the US does foresight; how China does foresight; how Russia does foresight.
  
• Launch of the Pulaski Institute, a "think tank focused on building a better global future that leaves fewer places behind."
• TNR: "Idaho Freedom Foundation, a conservative think tank, released a report accusing colleges of indoctrinating students in 'social justice ideology' and training them to 'identify, shame, and destroy oppressors,' who are, the report underscored, typically Christian, white, and male."

Think Tanks Snag Part of MacKenzie Scott's Billions

MacKenzie Scott, the former wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has just donated nearly $2.8 billion to 286 different organizations, the latest round of her massive donations which have left a handful of think tanks with piles of surprise cash.

The two most recent beneficiaries: Roosevelt Institute and Urban Institute.

Here is a clip from a Roosevelt Institute press release:

Today, the Roosevelt Institute’s efforts to move our nation toward a more equitable, democratic, and green future received a major boost from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, who announced Roosevelt as one of 286 recipients of new funding—directed to nonprofits identified as centering equity, social progress, and community engagement.

“By creating more democratic institutions and empowering disadvantaged communities to make decisions about their priorities and futures, we can seed civic engagement and rectify racial, gender, and economic inequalities,” said Felicia Wong, president and CEO of the Roosevelt Institute.

 

As of this writing, the Urban Institute has not released a statement on the donation.

Last year, Jeff Bezos gave the World Resources Institute (WRI) $100 million, the largest single donation a think tank has every received. 

David Callahan, founder of the website Inside Philanthropy, said that Scott has so far shown little interest in think tanks and research institutions that often shape policy in Washington and statehouses around the US.  "She just doesn't seem to be tuned in to that kind of stuff at all," he said.

Think Tank Quickies (#416)

• Atlantic Council EVP Damon Wilson named President & CEO of National Endowment for Democracy (NED). 
• China Daily: Chinese think tanks need to distinguish themselves from universities.
  
• Elliott Abrams joins 75 other national scholars and practitioners to launch the Vandenberg Coalition, a new network "committed to advancing a strong and proud American foreign policy."
  
• Tesla vice president Grace Tao, along with executives at Baidu Inc. and Alibaba, attended a policy discussion held by a Chinese think tank on data security.
• The Center for Responsive Politics and the National Institute of Money in Politics are merging to form OpenSecrets.
• Story of Patrick Syring, a US State Department employee who threatened staff at the Arab American Institute, a think tank James Zogby founded in 1995.
• Employ America: "A think tank focused on creating tighter labor markets." 
• UN turns to artificial intelligence (AI) in its peace efforts.  Will think tanks?
• Think tank policy and the 67th Montana legislature.
  
• Lose election, gain think tank (via Tevi Troy).
  

Biden Prepped by Think Tankers Before Putin Summit

Here is more from Axios:

President Biden assembled a group of outside Russia experts — including former Trump officials — to brief him for his summit with President Vladimir Putin, people familiar with the matter tell Axios.

Among the group of Biden briefers was Fiona Hill, a former National Security Council official who once said she considered feigning a medical emergency to cut short that news conference with Putin.

There were roughly a dozen participants, including two of President Obama’s former Russian ambassadors: Michael McFaul and John Tefft.

Rose Gottemoeller, an arms control expert now at Stanford University who served as deputy secretary general of NATO under Obama, and Eric Green, a career foreign service officer who is the NSC’s senior director for Russia, also participated.

 

Fiona Hill is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, and Michael McFaul is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution.  Rose Gottemoeller is a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

CAP Founder Pushed Gore to Warn Biden on Climate Change

Here is more from the Washington Post:

A number of Democrats are growing increasingly nervous that the White House could agree to a bipartisan infrastructure deal that scales back key climate-change initiatives, prompting a lobbying push that has included former vice president Al Gore making his case directly to President Biden.

The private warning last month from the climate hawk and Democratic grandee comes as Biden faces growing unease among liberals — including many administration officials — about his pursuit of Republican support for his next major spending package.

Gore called Biden to insist on the inclusion of climate policies after the encouragement of John Podesta, former chair of the liberal Center for American Progress think tank, said people briefed on the call, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss it.

 

John Podesta is the founder and a member of the Board of Directors of the Center for American Progress (CAP).  Podesta served as counselor to former President Barack Obama, where he was responsible for coordinating the administration's climate policies and initiatives.

Think Tanks Receiving Money From Nuclear Weapons-Producing Companies

The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) has just published a new report on global nuclear weapons spending in 2020.

The report says that in 2020, nine nuclear-armed states spent $72.6 billion on their nuclear weapons, more than $137,000 per minute.

Here is more from the report:

The $72.6 billion spent on nuclear weapons was split between governmental departments and private companies. Companies in France, the United Kingdom and the United States received $27.7 billion from nuclear-weapon-related contracts in 2020, of which $14.8 billion was new.

Those companies then funded think tanks that research and write about nuclear weapons policies. At least twelve major think tanks that research and write about nuclear weapons in India, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States received collectively between $5 million and $10 million from companies that produce nuclear weapons. The CEOs of companies that produce nuclear weapons sit on their advisory boards and are listed as “partners” on their websites.

 Here are the think tanks that reported income from nuclear weapons producers:

• Atlantic Council: $835,000 - $1,724,998
• Brookings Institution: $175,000 - $549,998
• Carnegie Endowment for International Peace: $50,000 - $199,998
• Center for a New American Security (CNAS): $1,085,000 - $1,874,991
• Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS): $1,530,000 - $2794,997
• Fondation pour la recherche strategique (FRS): amount not specified
• French Institute of International Relations: amount not specified
• Hudson Institute: $170,000 - $350,000
• International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS): $800,640 - $1,146,744
• Observer Research Foundation: $71,539
• Royal United Services Institute (RUSI): $610,210 - $1,445,581
• Stimson Center: $50,500

 

The report notes that many of those think tanks which received nuclear weapons-related money then turned around and wrote reports favorable to the industry.  One example, according to the report, is Atlantic Council, which received "upwards of $1.7 million in 2019 [and later] published an issue brief which recommended the United States proceed to develop 'low-yield' nuclear capabilities to deter Russia." 

ICAN says these think tanks "must stop" accepting money from companies with vested interests in maintaining and building more weapons of mass destruction, adding that "in the meantime, readers of these think tank reports should question if their policy recommendations or research topics are influenced by their funders.

A recent report from the Center for International Policy's (CIP) Foreign Influence Transparency Initiative (FITI) found that more than $1 billion in defense contractor and US government funds flowed to the top 50 most influential think tanks from 2014-2019.

Update: Here is a piece published on July 28 entitled "How the Nuclear Weapons Industry is Dominating Think Tank Research."

Think Tank Quickies (#415)

• The troubling business connections of Biden's Asia advisor Kurt Campbell, the co-founder of CNAS (via POGO). 
• Chinese "spies" at UK universities where academics are suspected of passing technology face arrest.
  
• Think tanks warn about China's global infrastructure build-up. 
• Foreign Affairs: What should universities, publishers, think tanks, and private sector firms be doing to fend off authoritarian influence and intimidation?
• Reimagining the modern think tank, via Emma Vadehra.
  
• Ramanan Laxminarayan, an Indian-American epidemiologist and director of the DC-based think tank Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, began an international fundraising campaign - raising more than $9 million to import oxygen cylinders and concentrators to India.
• Next100: "A startup think tank for and by a new generation of policy leaders."
  
• Scientific publishing is a joke.
• Blairite think tanks join forces in bid to broaden appeal.
  
• Media, think tanks set to boost RCEP exchanges.
  

Lawmakers Warned About Think Tanks Funded by Big Tech

The conservative advocacy group American Principles Project, founded by Princeton's Robert George, is warning Republican lawmakers and staffers to be wary of Big Tech attempts to "influence public policy on the Right" through think tank funding, according to Axios.  Here is an exerpt from a letter being sent to lawmakers:

I write to you today because the American conservative movement is deeply concerned about the effort of Big Tech and its allies to influence public policy on the Right.

The Daily Caller first documented this effort in 2019, pointing out that Google had contributed to “groups like R-Street, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), TechFreedom, the Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), to name a few.

Here is a copy of the letter being sent to to Capitol Hill.

The Heritage Foundation has recently turned down large donations from Facebook and Google.

Heritage is among more than 40 right-leaning research groups that have stopped accepting donations from tech giants.

Think Tank War Games Continue to Show US Losing to China

 Here is more from a recent Yahoo News piece:

Last fall, the U.S. Air Force simulated a conflict set more than a decade in the future that began with a Chinese biological-weapon attack that swept through U.S. bases and warships in the Indo-Pacific region. Then a major Chinese military exercise was used as cover for the deployment of a massive invasion force. The simulation culminated with Chinese missile strikes raining down on U.S. bases and warships in the region, and a lightning air and amphibious assault on the island of Taiwan.

The highly classified war game, which has not been previously made public, took place less than a year after the coronavirus, reportedly originating in a Chinese market, spread to the crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier, taking one of the U.S. Navy’s most significant assets out of commission.

In the early 2000s, China experts and military analysts at the RAND Corporation were given a trove of classified U.S. intelligence on Beijing’s military plans and weapons programs, and were asked to war-game a confrontation 10 years into the future.

What many Americans don’t realize is that years of classified Pentagon war games strongly suggest that the U.S. military would lose that war.

“Whenever we war-gamed a Taiwan scenario over the years, our Blue Team routinely got its ass handed to it, because in that scenario time is a precious commodity and it plays to China’s strength in terms of proximity and capabilities,” said David Ochmanek, a senior RAND Corporation analyst and former deputy assistant secretary of defense for force development.

 

RAND has compiled The US-China Military Scorecard: Forces, Geography, and the Evolving Balance of Power examining US and Chinese military capabilities in 10 operational areas, and presents a "scorecard" for each.

Here is a previous Think Tank Watch piece on US-China war games at RAND as well as details about wargaming at other think tanks.

Think Tankers Propose S&P-Like Ratings Agency for Think Tanks

Citing an increasing lack of trust of think tanks due to their waning intellectual independence as think tanks scurry to please donors through advocacy and de facto lobbying, two think tankers scholars are proposing the creation of a think tank ratings agency akin to Standard and Poor's or Moody's.

In a Foreign Policy piece entitled "Why Everyone Hates Think Tanks," Matthew Rojansky of the Wilson Center and Jeremy Shapiro of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), say that the new entity would be distinct from rankings like the deeply flawed and increasingly error-filled University of Pennsylvania's "Global Go To Think Tank Index," which is more akin to US News & World Report's rankings of colleges and universities.

Here is more about what they want to see in the "ratings" agency:

The point is not to rank think tanks relative to one another but to provide a good housekeeping seal of approval that would assess their capacity and willingness to follow good research practice and to provide truly independent policy recommendations. A condition of receiving ratings, at least for U.S.-based institutions, should be strict disclosure requirements, FARA registration when legally appropriate, and audited compliance with other best practices for tax-exempt public charities. Just as investors are discouraged from investing in low-rated bonds, potential think tank donors would find the ratings to be a useful shorthand for steering clear of funding organizations that don’t embrace best practices.

 

Here is a previous Think Tank Watch piece about the widely-cited UPenn think tank rankings.

Update: Dr. Dan Drezner, a Nonresident Senior Fellow at Brookings and a professor at Tufts University, has a new piece entitled "Does Everyone Hate Think Tanks?" which says that even the best think tank reforms are unlikely to change public perceptions.

Politico has also chimed in, saying that not everyone hates think tanks and saying there is a problem with the authors quasi-regulatory solution to the alleged problem.  Here are some additional reactions that Politico has documented.

PR firm Edelman has launched a new Trust Institute that will be a "global center for the study and cultivation of trust across business, government, media, and civil society."  Would they develop a ratings agency?

Think Tank Quickies (#414)

• Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) citing Mother Jones: "A leaked tape has revealed the campaign to restrict voter access in states across the US is being coordinated by the Heritage Foundation and funded by secret money."
  
• Just launched: Palm Beach Freedom Institute, a 501(c)(3) which aims to cancel out cancel culture.
  
• Think tanks have stolen universities clothes.
• New USMCA monitoring, research, and engagement project at Brookings.
  
• EPI's ad looking for a new think tank president.
  
• President of CFR Richard Haass awarded South Korean state medal.
• Foreign policy fight over university vs. think tank funding in Australia.
• Think tanks can link Taiwan, India.
• Pic: The world's coolest think tank?
  
• South Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs agreed to work together with a government agency overseeing state-run think tanks to draw up a blueprint for future relations with China.
  

Group Behind SolarWinds Hack Now Targeting Think Tanks

Think tanks are huge targets for  hackers and they face relentless assaults on their data, personnel information, sources, and inner workings.

Here is the latest example from Reuters:

The group behind the SolarWinds cyber attack identified late last year is now targeting government agencies, think tanks, consultants, and non-governmental organizations, Microsoft Corp said on Thursday.

"This week we observed cyberattacks by the threat actor Nobelium targeting government agencies, think tanks, consultants, and non-governmental organizations", Microsoft said in a blog.

Nobelium, originating from Russia, is the same actor behind the attacks on SolarWinds customers in 2020, according to Microsoft.

"This wave of attacks targeted approximately 3,000 email accounts at more than 150 different organizations", Microsoft said on Thursday.

 

Every major think tank in the US and many around the world have been hacked multiple times, with some facing near-daily hacking attempts.

US Senators Want Think Tanks to Come Up With China Strategy

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) and Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) have been offering various ideas on how the US can best compete with China, and they recently co-sponsored an amendment to a giant China-related bill Congress is working on that calls for think tanks to help with a US-China strategy.

Here is more on the amendment from a Romney press release: 

U.S. Grand Strategy with Respect to China.  Requires the President to develop and submit to Congress a grand strategy to address the new era of geostrategic and geoeconomic competition with China. Convenes an advisory board of outside experts from the private sector, academia, and think tanks to review the current strategy, including challenging its assumptions and approach, and make recommendations to the President for the strategy.

 

Romney has embraced think tanks for years, and when he ran for president in 2012, he selected advisors from think tanks like the Heritage Foundation, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), American Enterprise Institute (AEI), Brookings Institution, Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

During that time, Romney suggested that he supports the US government funding think tanks.

The Week recently said that Romney has emerged as a "one-man think tank," citing all the different policy ideas he has been proposing.

Trump Acolytes Build Ecosystem of Think Tanks so Trumpism Lives On

 Here is more from Bloomberg:

Allies of Donald Trump have built an ecosystem of think tanks, fund-raising outfits and professional development organizations designed to push his populist agenda for years to come whether or not the former president ever seeks office again.

With Trump-like branding, a number of the groups are named after his America First philosophy and serve to challenge the conservative orthodoxy of groups like the Heritage Foundation or the American Enterprise Institute whose ideas have guided generations of Republican politicians.

The aim is to develop the former president’s unorthodox policy preferences into a coherent program, ready-made for a new generation of politicians to adopt and carry out. No fewer than six new organizations so far are devoted to carrying on his policy legacy.

“There were fights that weren’t being fought,” said Russ Vought, Trump’s last director of the Office of Management and Budget. He started the Center for Renewing America, a think tank with a Capitol Hill office, and a companion grassroots advocacy organization, Citizens for Renewing America, about a week after leaving office in January. His policy shop has eight paid staffers, including Vought, but he wouldn’t release figures on its fundraising or finances.

 Stephen Miller, a former White House senior adviser and anti-immigration hardliner, is leading America First Legal, a nonprofit to preserve Trump’s policies on immigration and other issues. Jenna Ellis, who represented Trump and his campaign in some of its attempts to overturn last November’s election results, is chairwoman of the Election Integrity Alliance, which is focused on state voting laws. The group is part of the American Greatness Fund, a nonprofit set up by Brad Parscale, Trump’s former campaign manager.

And there’s the America Alliance, run by Michael Glassner, chief operating officer of Trump’s campaign, which is a new network of big donors who pledge to give at least $100,000 a year for candidates who support Trump’s agenda, and to his causes.

The biggest of the organizations is the America First Policy Institute, dedicated to advance what would have been Trump’s second-term agenda. The think tank has nearly 45 employees and a $20 million budget for its first year. It’s working out of an office building in Arlington, Va., with an eye toward moving to Washington. Its roster includes Pam Bondi, who defended Trump in his first impeachment trial, and former White House adviser Scott Turner.

 

As noted in the piece, it is unlikely that these groups are diverting money from more traditional conservative think tanks like Heritage, AEI and the Hudson Institute.  While former Trump officials have started their own think tanks and think tank-like entities, many have chosen to instead join the already-established traditional think tanks. 

Here is more about which think tanks former Trump officials have landed at.

Think Tank Quickies (#413)

• Since Jan. 1, 2020, Ely Ratner, DoD's new point man on China, has made $412,000 as EVP of CNAS.  [The president of CNAS made $408,230 in 2017.]
  
• On FARA and restoring trust in the think tank sector, via Ben Freeman and Eli Clifton.
• Bruegel is looking for a new director.
  
• Jared Kushner founds Abraham Accords Institute.  Others involved include Avi Berkowitz, Haim Saban, Yousef Al Otaiba, and Abdulla R. Al-Khalifa, and Gabi Ashkenazi.
• The ties that Brookings President John Allen has to Qatar. 
• RAND and Carnegie reports on responsible space behavior accepted for consideration by UN.
  
• "There's no such thing as a think tank emergency.  It is policy and it is papers.  Nobody dies." Christopher Ingraham: "I used to work at Brookings comms department and it was basically think tank emergency 75% of the time." 
• Online debate: Think tanks and the media.
  
• FP's Pacific Power Index: 50 people shaping the future of US-China relations; China Twitter: 100+ accounts you should follow (via SupChina).
• Pic: The various types of MENA think tank papers.
  

World's Largest Index of Think Tank Publications

The web-based application Overton says it is the world's largest searchable index of policy documents, guidelines, think tank publications, and working papers.

Here is more from the site:

[We] collect data from 182 countries and over a thousand sources worldwide with more being added all the time.

 We parse each document, finding references, people, and key concepts, and then link them to the relevant news stories, academic research, think tank output, and other policy.

Our products allow you to search these documents and see where your ideas, papers, reports, and staff are being cited and mentioned.

 

Here is more about Overton, which is based in London.  Annual subscription prices for think tanks and other non-university entities runs from $1,800 to $7,200, tiered by publication volume.

Think Tank Quickies (#412)

• Former Sen. Doug Jones (D-AL) joins Center for American Progress (CAP) as a Distinguished Visiting Fellow, focusing on criminal justice, democracy reform, and racial equity and justice.
  
• "Our (think tank's) sole purpose will be to transparently and independently peer review the output of other think tanks, rate their output, and shame cranks." 
• Harvard Institute of Politics (IOP) marred by tensions, turnover.
• Automotive Aftermarket Suppliers Association (AASA) Technology Council (ATC) launches new think tank groups.
• Rep. Will Hurd (R-TX), a trustee of the German Marshall Fund (GMF), is joining the board of OpenAI.
  
• Williams Institute: "A sexual orientation and gender identity think tank at UCLA School of Law."
• David Rothkopf, a former member of the US Institute of Peace's (USIP) advisory board, has a Twitter bromance with Ron Klain. 
• Steven Simon, a senior research analyst at the Quincy Institute, lost his position as a paid consultant with the Middle East Institute after visiting Bashar al-Assad in Damascus in 2015.
  
• Reshoring Institute: "A manufacturing policy think tank."
• Institute for National Defense and Security Research: "A think tank co-founded by Taiwan's defense ministry."
  

Think Tankers Come Under Fire for Attending China Summit

Here is more from The Washington Free Beacon:

The Democratic majority leader of the California state senate and officials from some of the United States's top foreign policy think tanks will speak this week at a forum organized by a group with close ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

The China Public Diplomacy Association, a group founded by China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, will host the 2021 China-U.S. Public Diplomacy Summit in Beijing on Friday. The association, which has received little attention in the West, is led by several officials at Communist Party front groups. Robert Hertzberg, the majority leader of the California Senate, is slated to speak on a panel at the summit, as are scholars from the Brookings Institution, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Wilson Center, the Asia Society, and other prominent U.S. think tanks.

The forum will be held in person at Renmin University in Beijing and streamed live on the internet. The itinerary does not say which American speakers will attend the event in person and which will attend virtually. 

 

When asked about the summit, China hawk Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said that "every think tank...should realize that meetings like these are influence operations organized by the Chinese Communist Party intended to slowly undermine America."

CAP Chief Neera Tanden Lands at the White House

Center for American Progress (CAP) President and CEO Neera Tanden has finally found her way into the White House after her nomination to be the director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) was withdrawn in March.

She will now be a senior advisor to President Joe Biden, according to various media reports.

Here is more from the Associated Press on what she will be doing in her new role:

She will launch a review of the US Digital Service and begin planning for possible policy changes that could result from the forthcoming Supreme Court decision on GOP legal challenges to the Affordable Care Act. Tanden worked in former President Barack Obama’s administration as the act was designed and implemented.

 

The Washington Post notes that Tanden is "particularly close" to White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, who played a "significant role" in her initial selection for the Cabinet.  He was also "instrumental" is helping Tanden land this new White House job, according to the Post.

Here is a statement from CAP Founder John Podesta on Tanden's appointment. 

Here is a Think Tank Watch list of think tankers who have gone into the Biden Administration.  Tanden is one of six think tank presidents who have been tapped for a White House post.

There is no official word yet as to who will replace Tanden at CAP.

How Bellingcat Was Embraced by the Atlantic Council

This is from the book "We Are Bellingcat" by Eliot Higgins, the founder of Bellingcat, an investigative website specializing in open-source intelligence:

Maks Czuperski, a young staffer at the Atlantic Council, the influential Washington-based think tank, knew of my work on Syria and Russia, and asked me if Bellingcat would embark on a joint project with them.  This, I realized, could provide the boost that we wanted, showing the powerful figures who circulated around the Atlantic Council that we were more than online amateurs.

Our first collaboration was a major report in May 2015, "Hiding in Plain Sight: Putin's War in Ukraine," about Russia's direct military involvement in eastern Ukraine.  The work made waves, and soon I was traveling the globe explaining these findings and what exactly Bellingcat did.

Two other major Atlantic Council report followed: "Distract Deceive Destroy: Putin at War in Syria" and "Breaking Aleppo," about the Assad regime's devastation of the city.  Another consequence of my period as a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council was our creation of the Digital Forensic Research Lab, today a leading incubator of open-source innovation, with its annual "Digital Sherlock" summit bringing together online sleuths from the around world.

 

Here is a link to the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRL) and here is the site for DigitalSherlocks. 

The book also that that Andy Carvin, who is a senior fellow at the DRFL, got nightmares and panic attacks from the work he did and was eventually diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Think Tank Quickies (#411)

• Breakthrough Institute: Absolute decoupling of economic growth and emissions in 32 countries. 
• Think tank research shows domestic extremism on the rise in the US.
• Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga spoke at CSIS event during US visit.
  
• Attention think tank panelists: "No one, in the history of time, has EVER heard a talk and thought: 'That was fantastic. I wish it was longer.'"
  
• Asia Society President and CEO mistaken for an Uber driver.
• Fuels Institute: A think tank founded by National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS) in 2013. 
• Which think tanks think about rural America? 
• Think tanks can get funding for US-Egypt-related projects via Public Diplomacy Small Grants Program, says US Embassy Cairo.
  
• Japan's regional think tanks.
  
• Meet the newest fake university (SRIIOTA), whose mascot is Carl the Soft Shell Crab.

The Swiss Billionaire Funding Democratic Think Tanks

Numerous billionaires, both Democrats and Republicans, fund numerous think tanks, a trend that has only been increasing over the years.

Here is the latest example from the New York Times:

He is not as well known as wealthy liberal patrons like George Soros or Tom Steyer. His political activism is channeled through a daisy chain of opaque organizations that mask the ultimate recipients of his money. But the Swiss billionaire Hansjörg Wyss has quietly become one of the most important donors to left-leaning advocacy groups and an increasingly influential force among Democrats.

Newly obtained tax filings show that Mr. Wyss’s foundations donated $208 million from 2016 through early last year to three nonprofit funds that doled out money to a wide array of groups that backed progressive causes and helped Democrats in their efforts to win the White House and control of Congress last year.

Beneficiaries of his direct giving included prominent groups such as the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank where Mr. Wyss sits on the board.

 

The Times has previously reported that the Center for American Progress (CAP) and its sister organization have received more than $6.1 million from foundations linked to Wyss.

NYT also noted that John Podesta, the founder of CAP, has advised the Wyss Foundation, including on the hiring of The Hub Project's executive director, Arkadi Gerney, a former official at CAP.

Update: Here is a 2022 Real Clear Politics piece on on Wyss's "mega influence" on US politics, including his think tank involvement.

Heritage Foundation Halts Donations from Big Tech

 Here is more Lydia Moynihan of the New York Post:

The Heritage Foundation has stopped accepting donations from tech giants amid an escalating battle with Silicon Valley over censorship, The Post has learned.

The influential conservative think tank — which famously turned pro-Trump after initial skepticism of his presidential candidacy, brokering appointments of cabinet members including Mick Mulvaney, Jeff Sessions and Betsy DeVos — said it will join a group of more than 40 right-leaning research outfits refusing to accept money from Big Tech firms including Google, Twitter, Facebook, Apple, and Amazon, according to a memo obtained by The Post.

Last month, dozens of conservative think tanks including the Family Research Council, Media Research Center, Center for Renewing America, and Citizens United pledged to turn down donations from big tech. Other big right-leaning research nonprofits like American Enterprise Institute, Mercatus, Cato Institute, the Manhattan Institute, the Hoover Institution and the Rand Corporation haven’t announced positions on tech donations. 

 

The New York Post notes that in early 2019, Google dissolved an advisory board on artificial intelligence (AI) that Heritage's James had served on after it received a petition signed by 2,500 employees demanding her removal, calling her "vocally anti-trans, anti-LGBTQ, and anti-immigrant."  The move was blasted by James in a Washington Post op-ed.

The NY Post also notes that a few months later, Google's YouTube removed a video posted by Heritage, saying comments made about transgender issues were "hate speech."

Here are some other anecdotes from NY Post:

In 2019, Twitter temporarily banned a Heritage employee who tweeted he believed transgender women who are born male should not be allowed to participate in women’s sports competitions, classifying the tweet as hate speech. Heritage mediated the situation and the employee regained access to his account without deleting the tweet.

Earlier this year, Amazon removed a book on transgenderism from its site, “When Harry Became Sally,” written by former Heritage employee Ryan T. Anderson. In February, US Sens. Marco Rubio, Josh Hawley, Mike Lee, and Mike Braun wrote Amazon a letter demanding an explanation for removing the book from its platform.

 

As Think Tank Watch previously reported, the Heritage Foundation recently turned down six-figure donations from Google and Facebook, although it has already accepted seven-figure donations from those firms.

Is Quincy Institute Washington's "Weirdest" Think Tank?

Here are some excerpts from a Tablet piece by Armin Rosen, entitled "Washington's Weirdest Think Tank":

The [Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft] titular director and president is Andrew Bacevich, a historian, former U.S. Army colonel, and a widely respected if sometimes overwrought proponent of the idea that a military-industrial complex has hijacked American society. The IRS document identifies Trita Parsi, head of the National Iranian American Council until 2018, as another one of Quincy’s co-founders and as its executive vice president. The tax exemption application lists Parsi’s estimated compensation at $275,000 a year, compared with $50,000 for Bacevich—a fair indication of who is actually running Washington’s weirdest and most intriguing foreign policy shop.

Chas Freeman, a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia and one of the elder statesmen of the realist movement in American foreign policy, told me he was “part of the group consulted about [Quincy’s] formation,” though he has no affiliation with the institute. “I think the main organizer was Trita Parsi, and perhaps that was a product of his disappointment as head of NIAC,” Freeman recalled. “I think he probably thought: How can I play a role in trying to shake things loose a little bit, not particularly on Iran, but generally.”

 

There are lots of juicy anecdotes throughout the piece.  Think Tank Watch's favorite line: "[Is Quincy] a three-ring circus of governmental, academic, and think tank washouts, funded by two megalomaniacal billionaires and led by a man alleged to be a cheerleader for a hostile foreign government?"

Entities and people mentioned in the piece include: Lawrence Wilkerson, Charles Koch Institute, Open Society Foundations, George Soros, Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF), Stephen Heintz, J Street, Arms Control Association, Ploughshares Fund, International Crisis Group, Robert Malley, Thomas Pickering, Francis Najafi, Adam Weinstein, Suzanne DiMaggio, Joe Cirincione, Colin Kahl, Lora Lumpe, Stephen Metz, Max Abrahms, Samuel Moyn, Javad Zarif, Charles Doran, John Mearsheimer, Bob Ney, Eli Clifton, Stephen Wertheim, Lawrence Wilkerson, Joshua Landis, Ford Foundation, Giustra International Foundation, Stephen Walt, Ron Burkle, and many others.

Here is a previous Think Tank Watch piece about the founding of the Quincy Institute.

Think Tank Quickies (#410)

• How media outlets describe DC's tax think tanks.
• On the UAE's strong relationship with US think tanks. 
• Japan's only national think tank covering security, the National Institute for Defense Studies, makes predictions on the Quad.
  
• Jelena Brankovic thread: Why rankings, such as those for think tanks, are awful.
• ADBI discusses ways to boost Central Asia's think tanks.
  
• C. Lea Shea is "founder and chairman of the Center for the Study of Great Power Competition, formerly known as the Long War Institute on Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency and, prior to that, as the New Globalization Initiative."
• Academics in Myanmar being rounded up and "disappeared."
  
• Former Brookings fellow Maati Monjib released from detention in Morocco.
  
• The National Pulse: China boasts control over Western think tanks. 
• "I would love to see a paper comparing the stock phrases used by think tanks in Brussels, London, and DC."