Energy expert Francisco Monaldi joins Emily and Geoff to discuss the U.S. government’s unusual oil deal in Venezuela. They get into the decades of missteps and corruption that have hampered Venezuela’s oil sector, the deep seated institutional changes that would be needed to bring production back to historical levels, and why you probably shouldn’t assume the contract the U.S. government just signed will actually last 100 years, as it says on paper. Francisco J. Monaldi is the Wallace S. Wilson Fellow in Latin American Energy Policy and director of the Latin America Energy Program at the Center for Energy Studies at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.

Francisco Monaldi, Baker Institute for Public Policy The White House, Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Announces Historic Oil Agreement to Secure American Energy Dominance and Drive Venezuela’s Economic Recovery, August 31, 2026 Francisco Monaldi, “Without Institutional Change, Venezuela’s Oil Bonanza Remains Unviable,” Americas Quarterly, January 26, 2026 Francisco Monaldi, Igor Hernandez, and Jose La Rosa, “The collapse of the Venezuelan oil industry: The role of above-ground risks limiting foreign investment,” Resources Policy Francisco Monaldi, “The Cyclical Phenomenon of Resource Nationalism in Latin America,” Oxford Encyclopedia of Latin American Politics Romulo Betancourt, Venezuela's oil

James Crabtree joins the podcast to discuss the new CNAS report he co-authored with Emily, Whither the Coalition? Assessing the Prospects of a Diverse Sanctions Coalition in Defense of Taiwan. Geoff, Emily, and James discuss the prospects of India, Singapore, and Germany joining the United States in a possible future Taiwan contingency scenario, including the political and economic constraints each country would weigh in making such a decision. James Crabtree is an Adjunct Senior Fellow in the CNAS Energy, Economics, and Security Program and a London-based geopolitical analyst and author with extensive experience working in Asia. Emily Kilcrease and James Crabtree, Whither the Coalition: Assessing the Prospects of a Diverse Sanctions Coalition in Defense of Taiwan, CNAS, August 18, 2026 Matthew Mingey, Laura Gormley, and Logan Wright, Avoiding entanglement: G20 responses in a Taiwan crisis, The Atlantic Council and The Rhodium Group, November 12, 2024 Howard Shatz et al., Economic Deterrence in a China Contingency, RAND, November 6, 2025 James Crabtree, The Billionaire Raj: A Journey Through India’s New Gilded Age James Crabtree, The Perimeter: America's Struggle for Primacy in the Pacific Sadanand Dhume, The Unpredictable Rise and Uncertain Future of Modern India

Paul Haenle and Terah Lyons of JPMorganChase join Emily and Geoff to talk about their recent report on U.S.-China AI competition and what policymakers miss when they only look at the latest AI model benchmarks. They get into the latest uproar over (yet another) capable Chinese AI model, what U.S. industrial policy for AI should look like, and how capital can be allocated amidst rapid technological change and massive geopolitical uncertainty.

Paul Haenle is Managing Director and Head of Asia Pacific (APAC) Policy and Strategic Competitiveness at JPMorganChase, where he leads strategy and external engagement on policy issues critical to the firm’s global competitiveness, including trade and investment, supply chains, technology, and infrastructure.

Terah Lyons is currently a Managing Director and the Global Head of AI and Data Policy at JPMorganChase, where she bridges the Chief Data and Analytics Office and Global Government Relations as a member of both executive teams, drives the company's global strategy, engagement, and positioning on AI, data, and digital policy issues, and support's the Firm's AI governance and responsible AI strategy.

Disclosure: Separate from this podcast, JPMorganChase is a financial supporter of CNAS. As with all of our supporters, we maintain strict intellectual independence and editorial discretion in our research products, including our podcasts. More information on our intellectual independence policy can be found on our website.

Christopher Miller, Chip War Dan Wang, Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future Geoffrey Gertz and Emily Kilcrease, Who Will Make Money on AI?, CNAS, May 5, 2026 Michael Cembalest, Patchmageddon: The race to patch software vulnerabilities before zero-day cyber-exploitations proliferate , JPMC, July 2026 JPMorganChase, Beyond the Benchmarks: A Systemic View of U.S.-China AI Competition, May 2026

Neil Shearing, The Fractured Age: How The Return of Geopolitics Will Splinter the Global Economy

David A. Gantz and Tony Payan, The Future of Trade: A North American Perspective

Emily Kilcrease and Geoffrey Gertz, Economic Security in North America: Recommendations for USMCA Review, December 3, 2025

Jamie Tronnes and Emily Kilcrease, “Trump’s Replacement Tariffs Will Have Unintended Consequences for USMCA,” National Review, June 12, 2026

Emily Kilcrease, “Statement for Office of the U.S. Trade Representative Hearing on Section 301 Investigations into Structural Excess Capacity,” May 5, 2026

Josh Kagan joins Emily and Geoff to give the big picture behind recent U.S. tariffs related to forced labor, as well as providing an insider’s view on the future of trade and labor issues. In an area that is often a blind spot for the U.S. national security community, Josh helps explain why labor issues have become central to the U.S. approach on trade. Josh Kagan is Special Counsel at Kelley Drye and previously served as the Assistant United States Trade Representative for Labor Affairs at USTR. USTR, Section 301 Investigation into Forced Labor Washington Post Editorial Board, “Trump tries a new trick to raise tariffs,” June 3, 2026 USTR, “Ambassador Greer Pens Letter to Washington Post Editorial Board in Response to June 3 Editorial” Jamie Tronnes & Emily Kilcrease, “Trump’s Replacement Tariffs Will Have Unintended Consequences for USMCA,”National Review, June 12, 2026 Robert Lighthizer, No Trade Is Free: Changing Course, Taking on China, and Helping America's Workers Michael Beeman, Walking Out: America’s New Trade Policy in the Asia-Pacific and Beyond Sherrod Brown, Myths of Free Trade: Why American Trade Policy Has Failed