The Person Advocates
Say Trump Should Pardon: NSA Whistleblower Reality Winner
commondreams.org
Reacting to Trump's tweet that Winner's 63-month sentence was
"So unfair," whistleblower advocates say the president should pardon
her
August 24, 2018
Whistleblower
advocates are calling on President Donald Trump to pardon former National
Security Agency contractor Reality Winner, who was sentenced Thursday to over
five years in prison for performing a "public service."
"I
think what has been done by the Trump administration to Reality is just
terrible, and it's one of the worst miscarriages of justice I've seen in a long
time."
—James Risen, The InterceptWinner, who was prosecuted under the Espionage Act, accepted a plea deal that sends her to prison for 63 months for leaking to the press in 2017 information that exposed a Russian cyberattack against U.S. voting systems. It's the longest sentence ever in federal court for leaking government information to the press.
Seizing
upon Trump's characterization of the sentence as
"unfair," some of Winner's advocates, including her mother, responded
to the president's tweet by saying he should exercise his authority to pardon
her.
"I
think what has been done by the Trump administration to Reality is just
terrible, and it's one of the worst miscarriages of justice I've seen in a long
time," said James Risen, The Intercept's
senior national security correspondent, to Democracy Now! on
Friday. "What Reality Winner did was a public service," he said.
"The
disclosure of the document in this, that The Intercept published,
... provided a really important wake-up call to the American people that ...
Russian intelligence was hacking into the election systems of states. And the
Senate Judiciary Committee, in a report earlier this year, wrote that the
Homeland Security Department had failed to adequately warn state election
officials about the Russian hacking threat, and said ... it was only because of
press disclosures that state officials began to be alerted to the Russian
threat, cyberthreat, which shows that even Congress recognizes that what
Reality Winner did was a public service," Risen said.
In a
statement issued Friday, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) also condemned the sentence.
"Reality
Winner's outrageous sentence is a clear threat to investigative journalism,
freedom of information, and the public's right to know, as it could have a
chilling effect on sources," said Margaux Ewen, RSF's North America bureau
director.
"We are concerned that her sentence is just the beginning
of an intense crackdown on whistleblowers led by Attorney General Jeff Sessions,
who threatened last year to stifle leaks with harsh federal punishment.
Winner's sentence shows that his threats are coming to fruition," she
added.
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"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their
lives." Eugene Victor Debs
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