Hudson in 5

Pax Silica: Under Secretary of State Jacob Helberg on the AI Race and Economic Security

Tomorrow, January 29, at 2:00 p.m., Jacob Helberg, the under secretary of state for economic affairs, will join Hudson for a discussion on the multilateral Pax Silica initiative, America’s strategy to win the global artificial intelligence race, and the Trump administration’s economic statecraft strategy.

Watch live here.

Xi Jinping Is More Intent on Personal Political Power than State Capacity

John Lee argued on Sky News that leadership purges in Beijing suggest that President Xi Jinping is removing political and military officials who may oppose a Taiwan invasion. This is a sign Xi is prioritizing the consolidation of his own power over the competence of his government, Lee said.

Watch here.

The Rise of the Tech Hamiltonians

Walter Russell Mead identifies a powerful coalition on the American right: a group of technology, finance, and business leaders best understood as the successors of the Hamiltonians for their continued commitment to the mutually beneficial relationship between an enterprise-friendly state and a dynamic private sector.

But these new “Tech Hamiltonians” reject much of the traditional approach. They are nationalist, rather than cosmopolitan. They do not see the European Union as America’s preferred partner abroad, and are focused on geopolitical and economic competition with China. And they believe in their own visions for the world and the transformative power of technologies like AI to realize them.

In The Atlantic, Mead explains the rise of this coalition and how it is reshaping American politics.

Read here.

US TikTok Deal Falls Short

On PBS News Hour, Michael Sobolik explained why the US deal to take control over the Chinese app TikTok does not go far enough to protect Americans from the Chinese Communist Party’s influence operations.

“The real concern here isn’t the data that it’s being trained on. It’s what the algorithm is emphasizing or censoring,” he warned.

Watch here.

Addressing Security Needs in the Arctic

At the World Economic Forum, President Donald Trump reassured Europe that the US would not take Greenland by force.

While analyzing the president’s speech on PBS News Hour, Rebeccah Heinrichs assessed American interests in the Arctic and Washington’s role in the current global order.

Watch here.

Before you go . . .

Europe does not currently have an adequate force posture to secure Greenland, a key location for the defense of the US homeland and many of its North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies.

On BBC Radio, Ezra Cohen explains that Trump’s negotiation tactics regarding the island reflect that the US has a strong hand, both militarily and economically, and that the White House will not shy away from applying pressure to protect US interests.

Listen here.