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Russia’s next target: Moldova? – On Friday, President Joe Biden will travel to Poland, a nation widely praised for taking in more than 2 million Ukrainian refugees. But pound for pound, tiny Moldova is pulling even more weight than Poland in welcoming Ukrainians fleeing Vladimir Putin’s invasion. Perhaps that is because Moldovans know what it is like to have Russians seize and partially occupy their country’s territory. The U.S. must do whatever it can to keep Moldova on track to receive EU membership. Moldova and the U.S. face common threats and share common goals. Because it borders Ukraine and desires to align itself with the West, Moldova matters more than ever. Washington must take notice and help in her and Ukraine’s hour of need. Heritage Expert: Alexis Mrachek
North Korea conducts successful ICBM test launch – The Biden administration announced it would impose additional sanctions on North Korea “to help prevent [North Korea] from accessing foreign items and technology that enable it to advance prohibited weapons programs,” though without providing specifics. This would be the third tranche of sanctions that the Biden administration has imposed on Pyongyang. However, successive U.S. administration have all refrained from fully enforcing UN resolutions and U.S. laws. The United States must ensure that it can protect the American homeland and U.S. forces in the Indo-Pacific region against the growing North Korean nuclear and missile threat. Heritage Expert: Bruce Klinger
Supreme Court Declines Religious Liberty Case, but 1 Justice Hints at Potential Outcome in Future Cases Like It – On Monday, the Supreme Court declined to hear the case of a religious organization claiming it had the right to refuse to hire individuals who did not share its religious beliefs. In denying the case on technical grounds, Justice Samuel Alito indicated that if it or a similar case came before the court in the future, the justices could likely find in favor of such a right for religious employers. Heritage Expert: Sarah Parshall Perry
Improving Defense Resourcing: Recommendations for the Commission on Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution Reform – At its core, the Defense Department’s planning, programming, budgeting, and execution (PPBE) process is a technical approach to a political issue. While technical problems need to be addressed by the financial management community of the Defense Department, politics will determine many of the big questions that determine the defense budget. It is impossible to avoid politics when the ultimate arbiter of the defense budget is Congress. The commission on PPBE reform needs to work within the limitations of that reality. The commission has the opportunity to improve how the Defense Department allocates its resources and how it plans for future developments. It needs to seize that opportunity to create lasting change that will enable the department to be more agile and more responsive to the changing demands of national defense. Heritage Expert: Frederico Bartels
Biden Needs to Lead From Ahead At NATO Summit - While in Europe, Biden must also strongly oppose French President Emmanuel Macron’s dangerous call for a European Union Army, which will split the Nato alliance down the middle, and will do the bidding of the Kremlin. Vladimir Putin would dearly love to see a paper tiger EU Army that undermines the cohesion and unity of Nato. President Biden needs to act like the leader of the free world and work on reassuring our allies, projecting strength and resolve in the face of the Russian bear. He has spectacularly failed to do until now. Heritage Expert: Nile Gardiner and James Carafano
What the Confirmation Hearing Told Us About Judge Jackson’s Judicial Philosophy - On Wednesday, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., made confusing what—at least until that point—had seemed relatively clear. Jackson said that searching for the “original public meaning” of the Constitution’s text was her interpretive “methodology.” Whitehouse, however, called originalism not a methodology, but a judicial philosophy which, he said, judges did not need to have at all. What? Heritage Expert: Thomas Jipping
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson Denies Connection to CRT. Her Past Says Otherwise. - In her exchange with Cruz, Jackson insisted that she had never studied CRT. “It wouldn’t be something that I would rely on if I was on the Supreme Court,” Jackson said to Cruz. In 2015, however, Jackson said that she tries to convince her students that sentencing “melds together myriad types of law” including “administrative law, constitutional law, critical race theory,” etc. Jackson also has closer ties to CRT. When Cruz asked Brown whether CRT was taught in schools, she responded, “I don’t think so. I believe it is an academic theory that is taught at the law school level.” That is in itself a red herring. Heritage Expert: Mike Gonzalez