MESSAGE
| DATE | 2020-08-16 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
|
| SUBJECT | Subject: [Hangout - NYLXS] Free Snoden Now
|
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-politics-snowden/trump-says-he-is-considering-pardon-for-leaker-edward-snowden-idUSKCN25B10Z
Trump says he is considering pardon for leaker Edward Snowden
Raphael Satter
3-4 minutes
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Saturday he is
considering a pardon for Edward Snowden, the former U.S. National
Security Agency contractor - now living in Russia - whose spectacular
leaks shook the U.S. intelligence community in 2013.
FILE PHOTO: Edward Snowden speaks via video link during a news
conference in New York City, U.S. September 14, 2016. REUTERS/Brendan
McDermid
The Republican president's comments followed an interview (here) Trump
gave to the New York Post this week in which he said of Snowden that
"there are a lot of people that think that he is not being treated
fairly" by U.S. law enforcement.
U.S. authorities for years have wanted Snowden returned to the United
States to face a criminal trial on espionage charges brought in 2013.
Snowden fled the United States and was given asylum in Russia after he
leaked a trove of secret files in 2013 to news organizations that
revealed vast domestic and international surveillance operations carried
out by the NSA.
Trump's softening stance toward Snowden represents a sharp reversal.
Shortly after the leaks, Trump expressed (here) hostility toward
Snowden, calling him "a spy who should be executed."
“I’m going to start looking at it,” Trump told reporters about a
possible pardon, speaking at a news conference at his Bedminster, New
Jersey golf club.
Trump said he thinks Americans on both the political left and the right
are divided on Snowden.
“It seems to be a split decision,” Trump told reporters. “Many people
think he should be somehow treated differently. And other people think
he did very bad things.”
Some civil libertarians have praised Snowden for revealing the
extraordinary scope of America’s digital espionage operations including
domestic spying programs that senior U.S. officials had publicly
insisted did not exist.
But such a move would horrify many in the U.S. intelligence community,
some of whose most important secrets were exposed. Trump has harshly
criticized past leaders of the U.S. intelligence community and FBI, and
on Thursday took aim at the bureau’s current director Christopher Wray,
his own appointee.
The U.S. Justice Department filed a lawsuit last September against
Snowden, arguing that his recently published memoir, “Permanent Record,”
violated non-disclosure agreements.
The Justice Department said Snowden published the book without
submitting it to intelligence agencies for review, adding that speeches
given by Snowden also violated nondisclosure agreements.
Trump’s use of his executive clemency powers including pardons often has
benefited allies and well-connected political figures.
He last month commuted the sentence of his longtime friend and adviser
Roger Stone, sparing him from prison after he was convicted of lying
under oath to lawmakers investigating Russian interference in the 2016
U.S. election to boost Trump’s candidacy.
Reporting by Raphael Satter; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Will Dunham
--
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that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological
proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
http://www.mrbrklyn.com
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