Derisky Business

Moving On From Free Trade with Mark DiPlacido

Geoff sits down with Mark DiPlacido of American Compass to discuss his recent series of essays, On Balance, that advocates U.S. trade policy should move away from the previous free trade paradigm and instead prioritize balance and reciprocity. They consider the extent to which the Trump administration’s trade policy is aligned with this framework and discuss what to watch for on the big trade stories of 2026, and later delve into what role think tanks play in the current policy environment.
Mark DiPlacido, “On Balance,” American Compass
Douglas A. Irwin, Clashing Over Commerce

Breaking the Rare Earths Dependency with Chris Kennedy

Geoff sits down with Chris Kennedy to unpack the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy and debate what it will take for the United States to overcome its dependency on Chinese rare earths. Chris is a Senior Economist with Bloomberg Economics’ Geoeconomics practice and a new Adjunct Senior Fellow with the Energy, Economics and Security Program.
Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department
Ryan Fedasiuk, “In Search of a China Strategy,” The American Enterprise, December 15, 2025
National Security Strategy 

What if 'America First' Appears to Work? With Tom Wright

Tom Wright joins to talk about his recent article, “What if 'America First' Appears to Work?" about the Trump administration’s “might makes right” approach to foreign policy, and whether this strategy is more politically viable than perhaps it should be, at least in the short term. Tom is senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and former senior director of strategic planning at the NSC under the Biden Administration.
Thomas Wright, "What If ‘America First’ Appears to Work?”, The Atlantic
Dan Wang, Breakneck: China's Quest to Engineer the Future 

BONUS: The Future of IEPPA Tariffs with Francesca Ghiretti

In a bonus episode this week, we're sharing an episode of the great Geoeconomic Competition podcast hosted by Francesca Ghiretti, director of the RAND Europe China Initiative and a research leader at RAND Europe. Geoff was a recent guest on the podcast to discuss Trump's tariffs and the future of US trade policy.
Listen to the Geoeconomic Competition podcast here.
Derisky Business is off next week for Thanksgiving, with episodes returning the following week. 
 

The Real Impact of SCOTUS's Tariff Hearing with Kathleen Claussen

Kathleen Claussen, Professor of Law at Georgetown University, joins Emily and Geoff to discuss the SCOTUS case on Trump's tariffs. They share their insights from the recent SCOTUS hearing, explore possible outcomes of the case, and lay out how the Trump administration will likely respond if some or all of the tariffs are struck down. Plus, Kathleen shares why she's not placing any Polymarket bets on the case's outcome.
Kathleen Claussen and Timothy Meyer, “The Foreign Commerce Power,” California Law Review, forthcoming, Duke Law School Public Law & Legal Theory Series No. 2025-44, August 24, 2025
Oral Arguments before the Supreme Court on the Legality of IEEPA Tariffs
International Economic Law and Policy Blog 
 

What's an Economic Security Agreement and Why Does the U.S. Need Them? With Peter Harrell

Derisky Business is returning for season 2! After a brief hiatus in which obviously nothing (nothing!) notable happened in the world of trade and economic security, Emily and Geoff are back to dive into all your favorite economic security topics. In their first episode back, they are joined by Peter Harrell, the host of the "Security Economics" podcast, to discuss the concept of economic security agreements and why the U.S. should start bringing economic security priorities like export controls into formal trade deals.
 
Geoffrey Gertz and Emily Kilcrease, “A World Safe for Prosperity-How America Can Foster Economic Security”, Foreign Affairs, February 6, 2025
Emily Kilcrease and Geoffrey Gertz, “Launch Economic Security Agreements” in CNAS Report: The First 100 Days
Peter Harrell, “How Trump’s trade agreements can reduce US and allied economic ties with China”, Journal of International Economic Law, July 2, 2025
Geoffrey Gertz, Analysis of the new US-Malaysia trade agreement, LinkedIn

Selling H20 Chips to China Will Come at a Cost, with Liza Tobin

We interrupt our summer break to provide quick reactions to news this week that the Trump administration will begin allowing Nvidia and AMD to sell certain advanced semiconductors to China - so long as those companies agree to pay a commission fee to the U.S. government. While Emily is on vacation, Geoff is joined by CNAS Adjunct Senior Fellow and Managing Director of Garnaut Global Liza Tobin to dig into how we got to this point, if this arrangement is even legal, and what it means for the future of U.S.-China tech competition.
Matt Pottinger and Liza Tobin, “Trump Just Handed China the Tools to Beat America in AI”, The Free Press, August 11, 2025
Chris Miller, “China has its own concerns about Nvidia H20 chips”, Financial Times, August 11, 2025
Charles Rollet, “China's military tried to buy Nvidia chips for AI servers and a robot dog”, Business Insider, August 1, 2025

Game Over? How the United States Could Have Won the Trade Wars

Emily and Geoff break their summer hiatus to launch a new CNAS report detailing insights from a trade wargame that examined how foreign governments might respond to a dramatic increase in U.S. tariffs. For this live event they are joined by trade experts Wendy Cutler, Meredith Lilly, and Thorsten Benner to discuss the report and catch up on the real-world trade wars. Derisky Business will return to regular programming in the fall.
Emily Kilcrease and Geoffrey Gertz, Game Over? How the United States Could Have Won the Trade Wars
 
 

Happy Summer from Derisky Business!

While Derisky Business goes on summer break, revisit your favorite episodes of the podcast and dive into the Summer Reading List, featuring book recommendations from previous podcast guests and work from CNAS experts. Emily and Geoff will be back in the fall to catch up on all the economic security happenings.
 
Read the list here!
 
https://www.cnas.org/publications/commentary/happy-summer-from-derisky-business

Richard Nephew on the U.S. military strikes on Iran’s nuclear program

Richard Nephew, expert on sanctions and Iran’s nuclear program, joins Emily and Geoff to discuss the long history of U.S. policy towards Iran, the role of sanctions in constraining Iran’s nuclear program, and why the United States decided to proceed with military strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. He also explains why the next phase of Iran’s nuclear program might be the most dangerous.
 
Notes:
Richard Nephew, The Art of Sanctions: A View from the Field
Richard Nephew, “A Last Chance for Iran,” Foreign Affairs
Richard Nephew, “Can Israel Destroy Iran’s Nuclear Program?” Foreign Affairs
Thomas Schelling, Arms and Influence
Suzanne Maloney, Political Economy of Iran Since the Revolution