Winter is Here: Recent Episodes
Renew Democracy Initiative
With Putin having openly invaded a free and democratic nation, the global war between democracy and tyranny is officially out in the open. Join us as we discuss what's happening in this war and how the Free World can win!
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This morning, in a move that resulted from Russia’s failures in Ukraine, Wagner forces under mercenary leader Yevgeny V. Prigozhin seized the city of Rostov-on-Don without firing a shot and began advancing towards Moscow.
This represents a serious escalation of the long-simmering tensions between the Russian mercenary group and the official military authorities, but more importantly it finally puts to bed the lie that Putin is some kind of strategic mastermind. Prigozhin, with a few thousand men, was essentially able to defy the entire Russian government and move forward almost unopposed.
A few hours later, it appears that Act I of this drama concluded with Prigozhin announcing that his forces were “turning around our columns and returning to field camps according to plan.” This isn’t the end of this intra-Russian conflict, but merely an intermission. Reverberations from Prigozhin’s rebellion will continue to be felt for weeks in both Russia and on the battlefield in Ukraine.
Ultimately, the single greatest impact of this surprise turn of events is demonstrating to both Russian citizens and the world at large that the Emperor has no clothes. For all of Putin’s posturing, he presides over a Potemkin village whose power—both military and otherwise—has clearly been overstated.
Join RDI Chairman Garry Kasparov and RDI Executive Director Uriel Epshtein for a special episode to analyze what’s been going on and stay tuned as events continue to unfold.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
In our final podcast of 2022, we’re going to take a bit of a different look at the global fight between tyranny and democracy by focusing on our internal struggle. The health of American democracy is critical to the global fight for freedom. As America, so the world. With this in mind, I wanted to dive into the conversation around the January 6th report and get a sense of how we got here and the impact the committee will have as Republicans get ready to take the House. Former Senator Heidi Heitkamp and former US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Preet Bharara join me for this special episode of Winter is Here. We discuss the findings of the committee's final report, the distinctions between free speech, political speech, and criminal culpability, Trump's path to an indictment, and what it all means for the future of American democracy.
Heitkamp served as North Dakota's Attorney General from 1992 to 2000, and as a US Senator from 2013 to 2019. She currently serves on the boards of the McCain Institute, the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, and the German Marshall Fund. Recently, Heitkamp was named director of the University of Chicago's Institute of World Politics. She is also a frequent contributor to politics and public affairs for ABC News and CNBC.
Preet was the former US Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2009 to 2017. As US Attorney, he oversaw the investigation and litigation of all criminal and civil cases brought on behalf of the United States in the Southern District of New York. Currently, he is a partner at the law firm Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr.
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Today’s episode is one that I was very excited about, but before I get into it, I want to offer a quick update on my recent trip to Berlin. Jeff Gedmin and I were joined by a few journalists as well as a number of Ukrainian, German, and Polish thought leaders to see how the West could come together to join forces in support of Ukraine. This is just the beginning of a series of dialogues RDI will host in coordination with American Purpose. We’ll keep you apprised of how these conversations go and what they will produce. And now, onto the episode!
I’m joined by Fiona Hill for a conversation on how Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s psychology informs his decision making in the war in Ukraine, and how it may inform the decision making of dictators everywhere. We discuss Putin’s calculated choice to escalate the war in Ukraine, the many ways Putin could lose control over Russia, Putin’s connection to Zelensky and Trump, the possibility of nuclear war, and the necessity of maintaining a united front against Russian aggression.
Fiona was the deputy assistant to the president and senior director for European and Russian affairs on the National Security Council from 2017 to 2019. She served as a national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council from 2006 to 2009. Prior to that, she held numerous positions at the Eurasia Foundation in Washington, D.C. and Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Fiona is currently a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Center on the United States and Europe and has written extensively on Russian history, Vladimir Putin, and geopolitics.
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I’m joined by Larry Diamond for a conversation on how our social media ecosystem amplifies extremist movements and empowers authoritarian regimes such as China, Iran and Russia. We discuss how our democracy at home relates to the fight for freedom abroad, the perverse incentives of today's social media ecosystem, Twitter’s fate, and how Russia’s war against Ukraine relates to Taiwan.
Larry Diamond is one of the foremost experts on the study of democracy. He is a Senior Fellow in Global Democracy at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Larry is also a Senior Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, where he leads its programs on China's Global Sharp Power and on Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific Region. He is the co-founding editor of the Journal on Democracy and the author of numerous books, the most recent being "China's Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance."
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As Iran enters its fourth week of protests, Roya Hakakian joins Uriel Epshtein for a conversation on Iran and its place in the global battle between tyranny and freedom. They discuss the murder of Mahsa Amini, the irrationality of Iran's morality police, and how the situations in Ukraine and Iran are connected.Â
Roya Hakakian is a writer, journalist, poet, and political activist. She was a founding member of the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center and is a permanent member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Roya has served on the board of Refugees International, a non-profit dedicated to human rights and the relocation of refugees, and as a fellow at the Whitney Humanities Center at Yale University. Her writing appears in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and NPR's All Things Considered.
The Winter is Here podcast and the newsletter The Democracy Brief will be running on alternating Thursdays.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
Jeffrey Gedmin joins Uriel Epshtein for a special conversation from Berlin, Germany. They have spent the week meeting with German lawmakers to make the case that Germany could be doing more to support Ukraine’s fight for freedom. In this conversation, they discuss whether German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s commitment to fight authoritarianism will be backed up with concrete policy or if Germany’s backlash to the Russian invasion of Ukraine is just talk.
Jeffrey Gedmin is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the magazine American Purpose. He is the former CEO of Radio Free Europe and previously ran the Legatum Institute in London and the Aspen Institute in Berlin.
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In this special episode of Winter is Here, Uriel and Garry take a step back to look at how we got here and how we can avoid the mistakes of the past. We highlight the importance of signaling mechanisms on the global stage, whether we can have an impact on Russian public support for the war, and how the Free World can deter Putin and other dictators moving forward.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
Uriel and Peter discuss the information war over Ukraine, how Putin’s propaganda shapes Russian public opinion, and how we can create a freedom-first narrative capable of overcoming Putin’s (and other would-be authoritarians’) “firehose of falsehoods.”Â
Peter Pomerantsev is a Senior Fellow at the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University and at the London School of Economics. He is a noted expert on combating disinformation and the author of This is Not Propaganda: Adventures in The War Against Reality and Nothing is True and Everything is Possible.
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We discuss what inspiration we can draw from Ukraine’s fight for its survival and what we can learn from Abraham Lincoln about defending liberalism as we square off against political extremism.
John Avlon is a Senior Political Analyst and anchor at CNN and the former editor-in-chief and managing director of The Daily Beast from 2013 to 2018. He is also the author of several books including, most recently, Lincoln and the Fight for Peace.
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Uriel and President Toomas Hendrik Ilves discuss cybersecurity, what the Free World can learn from Estonia, and whether one can enjoy Russian culture even as the specter of Russian authoritarianism looms over Europe.Â
After a career as a diplomat and journalist, Ilves led Estonia’s Social Democratic Party in the 1990s, before serving as Foreign Minister from 1996 to 1998 and again from 1999 to 2002. He was a member of the European Parliament from 2004-2006 and served as President for two terms from 2006 to 2016.
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This week, in a special edition of Winter is Here, Uriel Epshtein moderates a panel on the state of the NATO alliance, how far members should go to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia, and what its role will be to counter authoritarianism in the future. Former US Secretary of Defense General James Mattis and French Admiral Edouard Guiallaud joined Uriel at the Tocqueville Conversations in Normandy, France, co-hosted by The Tocqueville Foundation, Le Figaro and The Atlantic Council.
Gen. James Mattis is a retired four-star general, having served for over forty years in the U.S. Marine Corps. After serving as the commander of all U.S. forces in Central Command, he retired from the Corps and was the Davies Family Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, before serving as the U.S. Secretary of Defense from 2017 to 2019 under President Trump.
Adm. Edouard Guillaud has served as captain of the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Charles De Gaulle from 1999 to 2001; and as the Chief of the Military Staff under President Nicholas Sarkozy from 2007 to 2010. He has been a close aide to 3 Presidents, 4 Prime Ministers, & 5 Ministers of Defense and has commanded French forces in Libya and Mali, before leaving active duty in 2014.
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Few people understand how much bravery it took Cassidy Hutchinson to testify better than Lt. Col. Alex Vindman, who sacrificed his own military career to come forward after Trump tried to blackmail Ukrainian President Zelenskyy. Now, Alex rejoins Winter is Here to discuss what gives people the bravery to come forward, what might come out of January 6th, and how this all relates to Putin's horrific invasion of Ukraine.
Lieutenant Colonel Alexander S. Vindman (Retired) was most recently the director for Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Russia on the White House’s National Security Council. His book “Here, Right Matters” (HarperCollins) was published in 2021.
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In this week’s episode of Winter is Here, Sen. Heidi Heitkamp joins Uriel Epshtein to discuss the urban-rural divide and the impact it has on democracy in the US and around the world.Â
Heidi Heitkamp is a former Democratic senator from North Dakota who served from 2013 to 2019. She is the president of the Renew Democracy Initiative’s board, and the founder and Chair of the One Country Project, an organization focused on addressing the needs and concerns of rural America. She is a contributor to CNBC.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
In this week’s episode of Winter is Here, Bill Kristol joins Garry Kasparov and Uriel Epshtein to discuss how Putin’s war in Ukraine, Trump’s impeachment, and the January 6th hearings are connected and what we can do to get people to care about defending freedom domestically and internationally.Â
Bill Kristol served as Chief of Staff for Vice President Dan Quayle and led the Project for the Republican Future, where he helped shaped the strategy that produced the 1994 Republican Congressional victory. In 1995 he founded The Weekly Standard, which became one of the foremost magazines in conservative intellectual thought. He is the founder of Defending Democracy Together.
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Before beginning to describe this week’s episode, I’d like to announce that the Winter is Here podcast and James’ Democracy brief will go on a 2-week hiatus from May 23rd until June 6th as we will be joining my co-host Garry for the Oslo Freedom Forum in Norway and other promising meetings in Europe. However, while we’re gone, you can listen to RDI’s Director of Education, Pastor Evan Mawarire, in his Frontlines of Freedom podcast. Where Winter is Here is more of an analysis of different strategies in the global war between tyranny & democracy, Evan’s podcast is more about individual stories of inspiration and resilience. He’ll be speaking with dissidents who have found the courage to overcome incredible hardship in a way that should offer us hope for our own lives – whether we’re fighting for justice or just fighting to put food on the table. While we are still tinkering with our release schedule, for the next two weeks, Evan’s podcast will be released on Fridays.
Now, on to our main event… Ruth Ben-Ghiat is the Professor of History and Italian Studies at New York University. She is an MSNBC Opinion Columnist and commentator on CNN, MSNBC, and other media outlets about authoritarianism and threats to democracy around the world.
Her latest book, Strongmen: From Mussolini to the Present examines how illiberal leaders use corruption, violence, propaganda, and machismo to stay in power, and how resistance to them has unfolded over a century.
She joined me to discuss how anti-globalist populists are frequently the most globalist leaders of all, how we can prevent dirty money from corrupting the free world, and why tyrants like Putin actually need to be humiliated in order to be stopped.
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Bret Stephens is a New York columnist. He won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary at The Wall Street Journal in 2013, was previously editor in chief of The Jerusalem Post, and is known for his sharp, contrarian takes. He is the author of America in Retreat: The New Isolationism and the Coming Global Disorder" (2014).
He joins Uriel to offer his take on why the Free World is actually in a strong position to reverse the tide of authoritarianism, why democratic pessimism might be a good thing, and how to make sure that self-reflection doesn’t become self-flagellation.
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Timothy Snyder is a professor of history at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. One of the most prominent historians of Eastern Europe, he speaks five and reads ten European languages. His many books, including Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (2010), On Tyranny(2017), and The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America (2018) are highly influential in Eastern European history and understanding our democratic crisis.
He joins Uriel and Garry to discuss the historical trends that led to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, why history is NOT destiny, and the role that history (or mythology) can play in our decision-making.
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Laure Mandeville is a senior reporter at the center-right Le Figaro, the largest national French newspaper where she hosts a weekly page on intellectual debates around the world and has served as the bureau chief in Moscow and Washington. She is also the founder of the Tocqueville Conversations on the future of democracy and has recently published a new book – Les révoltés d’occident – The insurgents of the West from Trump to Zemmour.
She joins RDI’s Executive Director Uriel Epshtein to discuss what France’s presidential election & the preceding campaign entails for its role in the world moving forward, how Putin’s war against Ukraine changed the dynamics of the race, and how the French view Americans (hint: not always so well). Join us for a fascinating conversation and subscribe at www.rdi.org or by clicking the button below.
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Tom Tugendhat is a member of the British Parliament and the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. He is also a Lieutenant Colonel in the Territorial army and has served in Iraq and Afghanistan in addition to having been the principal advisor to the Chief of the Defense Staff (IE: the Professional Head of the British Armed Services).
Listen to Tom, Garry Kasparov, and Uriel Epshtein discuss how the war in Ukraine is evolving, what countries are supporting Russia, what victory could look like, and how we can achieve it.
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Pastor Evan Mawarire is the founder of the #ThisFlag Citizen Movement in Zimbabwe, which brought millions of people onto the streets to confront corruption, injustice, and poverty, and was ultimately instrumental in unseating Robert Mugabe. In 2016, Evan was named the African of the year by the Daily Maverick newspaper of South Africa and one of the 100 top global thinkers of 2016 by Foreign Policy Magazine. Unfortunately, since then, Evan has had to leave Zimbabwe for his own safety, but has served as a fellow at Stanford’s Centre for Democracy Development & Rule of Law and was a 2020 Yale university World Fellow. Currently he is a fellow with the National Endowment for Democracy and RDI’s inaugural Director of Education.
Join us as we discuss how to maintain resilience in the face of overwhelming odds, what dissidents can teach those of us in the Free World about democracy, and how we can unite to combat the forces of authoritarianism worldwide.
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Leopoldo Lopez is one of the most prominent Venezuelan opposition leaders. For openly challenging dictators like Chávez and Maduro, he was sentenced to 13 years in prison. He famously turned himself in and ended up spending 3 years in a military prison, and 2 under house arrest. During the 2019 uprising against Maduro’s regime, Lopez escaped house arrest and sought refuge in the Spanish Embassy, where he remained for over a year. In 2020, he escaped from Venezuela in disguise over the border into Colombia.
He joins Uriel Epshtein to discuss how he developed the resilience to survive 3 years of solitary confinement, what inspires him about American democracy, and why the Venezuelan opposition chose to hang the Ukrainian flag outside of the Venezuelan Embassy in D.C. Our conversation hinges on why all the sacrifices he has made in his now-global fight against dictatorship are worth it.
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Bill Browder is the founder and CEO of Hermitage Capital Management, which was the investment adviser to the largest foreign investment fund in Russia until 2005, when Bill was denied entry to the country and declared a “threat to national security” as a result of his battle against corporate corruption. His colleague, tax lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, was detained and murdered by Putin’s regime in 2009 for uncovering state corruption. In 2012, Browder successfully lobbied the US Congress to pass the Magnitsky Act, a bipartisan bill to punish those in Russia responsible for Magnitsky’s death. Bill is the author of the New York Times bestseller Red Notice, and the upcoming book Freezing Order, available April 12th.
This week he joins Garry Kasparov and Uriel Epshtein for a discussion on corruption in Russia, how sanctions can weaken Putin along with his propaganda and war machines, and what it would take to make sanctions effective.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit renewdemocracy.substack.com
On this episode of Winter is Here, we welcome former poker world champion and decision scientist Annie Duke. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has all of us wondering how you can make good decisions when the stakes are astronomical. We dive into the psychology of decision making with lessons that apply as much to daily life as to geopolitics. And with a poker world champion and chess grandmaster on the podcast, we had to ask—is Putin playing poker or chess?
Also released today is this week’s Democracy Brief on the unlikely coalition forming to blame the United States for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Read the full piece here.
Last, we want to offer you a final reminder to sign up for our Briefing with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba happening live Tomorrow at 11am ET! Foreign Minister Kuleba will almost certainly be joined by soldiers who can offer testimony directly from the frontlines. Also on the panel will be Garry Kasparov, Alexander Vindman, CĂ©line Boustani, and Uriel Epshtein. Please sign up here for this truly unique opportunity.
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We’re bringing you a special episode of Winter is Here this week where Uriel speaks with Ukrainian Colonel Oleksandr Gain out of Kyiv. Colonel Gain offers a more personal take on Russia’s invasion of his country and insight on Ukraine’s response based on his 20+ years in the Ukrainian military.
As this conflict rages on, RDI is committed to bringing you voices from the front and working to galvanize the Free World to come to the defense of democracy. Consider donating to RDI here.
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World War III is upon us—in fact, it has already begun. We are doing our best to keep you informed by launching a new podcast, moving our newsletter onto Substack, and offering guest contributions from experts such as my partners on RDI’s Board.
For more than a decade, Vladimir Putin has waged war on the civilized world of international law, democracy, and any threat to his power. The Cold War didn’t end; the West quit.
Ukrainians are fighting on the frontlines of this global war. They battle against a dictator emboldened by two decades of friendly treatment and concessions from the West. With each death, the Ukrainian people pay a debt that the US and EU accrued every time they chose to appease Putin.
The advance of Putin’s army didn’t start with Ukraine, and he has no plans to stop it there. If you fear that NATO will come into direct conflict with Russia’s army, you should. Putin intends it. He will march his army west past the Dnieper onto the border of Poland. He will order it north toward the Baltic states, which he has demanded lose their full NATO status. He will do all of this because he can, and he can because we let him.
Putin’s battle is in Ukraine, but his war is against democracy. Peaceful and prosperous democracies are proof to the Russian people that Putin’s reign is a catastrophic mistake. As his dictatorship could never deliver for the Russian people like a democracy could, he must degrade democracy wherever it exists. In Western Europe and the United States, that has meant meddling in elections, financing extremist parties, and funding troll farms to drive hateful division. In Ukraine, it means war.
I joined other leaders, activists, journalists, and academics to found RDI on the belief that the fight to achieve democracy in oppressive countries and the struggle to defend it in America are connected. When Putin marches into a neighboring country to prop up its dictator or destroy its fairly-elected government, his target is democracy everywhere. When democracy falters in the United States, it strengthens Putin and other dictators like him. The crisis in Ukraine is throwing this fact into sharp relief, and our work is as important as ever before.
This crisis is demanding, and as it unfolds we want to offer you as much as we can. As an organization, we are transitioning some of our content onto Substack, where we can expand into new media, host guest contributions from experts such as my partners on RDI’s Board, and encourage comments and conversation among our community.
As the first new offering, I’m launching Winter is Here, a podcast with RDI’s executive director, Uriel Epshtein. Each Friday, we’ll release an episode discussing the global war between freedom and tyranny. Our inaugural episode launches today, and you can find it at the top of this post. We spoke with Lt. Col (Ret) Alexander Vindman, whose expertise and personal bravery have never been more relevant.
Our weekly Democracy Brief newsletter, written by our brilliant Content & Strategy Manager, James Lewis, will continue to arrive in your inboxes on Thursday mornings as usual. It will look a bit different and the author won’t be anonymous any longer, but you can expect the same wide-ranging analysis of topics related to democracy in the US and abroad.
With this change, we’ll also be able to offer you exclusive content from the RDI network, with guest pieces landing in your inbox either in place of the regular newsletter or as additional op-eds, videos, or podcasts.
Lastly, we want to build a community together. While we’ll keep offering our analysis of the pressing stories in democracy in the US and around the world, we want you to be able to discuss them, ask questions, and offer your thoughts as well. On Substack, our comments will be open where we encourage you to react to our work, share your opinion, and discuss what needs to be done to defend democracy. In the future, we intend to create more opportunities for you to engage with us in Q&A’s, happy hours, and open conversations.
The tragedy in Ukraine demands our attention, and we will do our best to answer that call. All the while, we won’t ignore the crisis in democracy in America that is both aiding Putin’s aggression and is exacerbated by it. As we embark on this next phase in RDI’s history with you, we encourage you to share this post with your friends and colleagues and invite them to join our community.
Garry Kasparov
RDI Founder & Chairman
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