espionage act

Support of Julian Assange outside the Ecuadorian Embassy (Hans Crescent, Knightsbridge, London). Marshall24 /Flickr

Former NSA contractor Reality Winner pled guilty to one count of violating the Espionage Act when she disclosed an NSA report that claimed Russian hackers targeted United States voter registration systems in the 2016 election.
The guilty plea was part of a change of plea hearing in federal court in Augusta, Georgia, and the result of a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Under the plea agreement, the government agreed to offer her 63 months in prison. That is five years and three months. The maximum sentence for a violation of the Espionage Act is 10 years.

AUGUSTA, GEORGIA — Reality Leigh Winner — a former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor and linguist, and the first person to be charged with violating the Espionage Act on President Donald Trump’s watch — has signed a plea agreement, according to the Courage Foundation.

MINNEAPOLIS – Despite concern that the United States will soon find itself in a major war that could have global consequences, many Americans are uninterested in that eventuality as shown by the minimal attention major geopolitical events, like the recent bombing of Syria or the 17-year-long occupation of Afghanistan, receive compared to the President’s alleged sexcapades and rapper Kanye West’s tweets.

President Donald Trump pardoned Navy sailor Kristian Saucier, who pled guilty to violating the Espionage Act after he took photos with his cell phone of a “nuclear attack submarine.” He also destroyed evidence after FBI and NCIS agents interrogated him.

Journalist Kevin Gosztola of Shadow Proof joins me for an in depth discussion of the Reality Winner whistleblowing case. We begin by recapping the case itself and who Reality Winner is. Kevin talks about Winner’s career in the Air Force and later with the NSA as a contractor. We talk about what Winner is accuses of doing: leaking a classified report on Russian hacking of voter software to The Intercept. Kevin touches on The Intercept’s sloppy handling of Winner’s information, and how this contributed to her ultimate arrest.

Defense attorneys for NSA whistleblower Reality Winner contend whether she asked to end her FBI interrogation or leave her home when agents arrived has “little bearing” on whether she was in custody and deserved to be read her rights.
Winner is an NSA contractor who is accused of mailing a classified document on Russian hacking to The Intercept. She was charged with violating the Espionage Act and is currently in detention awaiting trial.

By James Bovard | Future of Freedom | August 2017 edition President Trump’s firing of FBI chief James Comey on May 9 spurred much of the media and many Democrats to rally around America’s most powerful domestic federal agency. But the FBI has a long record of both deceit and incompetence. Five years ago, Americans […]

An FBI agent who entered former NSA contractor Reality Winner’s house to execute a search warrant did not think she was a “big bad mastermind prolific spy.” And yet, the government is prosecuting Winner under the Espionage Act, as if she is some kind of spy.
Winner is accused of “removing classified material from a government facility and mailing it to a news outlet.” She allegedly mailed a classified document on Russian hacking to the Intercept and is in pretrial detention awaiting a trial that is currently scheduled for March.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions speaks during a briefing on leaks of classified material one week after President Donald Trump complained that Sessions was weak on preventing such disclosures, Aug. 4, 2017.(AP/Andrew Harnik)
WASHINGTON – In the nearly 100 years since enactment of the 1918 Espionage Act, the government has chosen – out of respect for press freedom – not to prosecute journalists.