Foreign Policy

Employees at the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a US government-supported international media arm, are sounding alarm bells of a “coup attempt” behind closed doors to install new leaders allied with Steve Bannon, the right-wing firebrand and former White House strategist. André Mendes, a longtime BBG official, and Jeffrey Shapiro, a former Breitbart contributor-turned-senior advisor to the BBG, conspired to oust the current leadership, four current and former BBG officials say.

Department of Homeland Security draft report from late January called on authorities to continuously vet Sunni Muslim immigrants deemed to have “at-risk” demographic profiles.

Apparently, President Donald Trump personally made the decision to curtail the testimony of former chief White House political strategist Steve Bannon before the House Intelligence Committee.  President Trump acted to limit Bannon’s testimony based on legal advice provided by Uttam Dhillon, a deputy White House counsel, who concluded that the administration might have legitimate executive privilege claims to restrict testimony by Bannon and other current and former aides to the president, apparently.

When thousands of Iranians streamed onto the country’s streets the week of Dec 25 to protest government corruption and the dilapidated economy, authorities in Tehran reverted to a well-known playbook. On Dec 31, the government shut down Telegram, a messaging platform used by more than 40 million Iranians. Instagram and other social media soon followed. The mullahs’ intentions were clear: to block access to digital platforms used by protesters to spread information about the uprising. But the government’s crackdown found support from a surprising source — the American sanctions regime.