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Daniel Ellsberg
I wasn't the first whistleblower in America or the first leaker of classified information? Of course, that goes on almost every day, every hour. Some part of the government putting out classified information that serves some agency or serves the president's policy that's authorized disclosure in effect of classified information. But there have been major leaks, of course, before me and after me. I was the first American to be prosecuted for giving information on unauthorized classified information to the American public. And I was prosecuted under the Espionage Act, which had never been intended or shaped for such a prosecution.
It was intended for spies. And people give information secretly to a foreign government to advantage them, especially in wartime. An enemy in wartime often being used for that, never used before me for a non-espionage case of a leaker or whistleblower when used three, two other times before Obama, three altogether before President Obama or President Obama brought nine such cases against former officials like me or current officials who put out classified information that embarrassed or incriminated the government, unlike the kind that they put out hourly or daily on their own behalf. But information that's incriminating or embarrassing and most information that is classified or kept classified is so because it might be embarrassing to a government official or a policy or incriminating in various way.
So there have been, as I say, more like a dozen cases before Trump. Trump has brought even more cases in his three years than Obama did in four years than Obama did in 12 years. But it was foreseeable that by the ACLU that he would go even further and be the first, bring the first case, against a journalist, not a former official, but somebody who informs the public as a journalist or a publisher like Julian Assange.
Now, for 50 years since my case ended 47 years ago, I've been telling journalists that the wording of the Espionage Act was right there to indite them and in fact, even go further to indite readers who were unauthorized to get the classified information that a newspaper gave them could be used. The Espionage Act could be used, but in particular against a journalist. And I would say I've had no effect in getting journalists, mainstream media either to look at the secrecy system or the law, see their vulnerability and see the urgency of changing those laws.
But they said, well, they're not used. It would be unconstitutional to use it against us. And they haven't done it, so we're not worried about it, like just like Trump was not worried about the pandemic. But actually, it turns out Trump was worried about the pandemic and just didn't tell us. Unfortunately, the journalists haven't been in that position and he really haven't had to worry. Now, the Assange prosecution puts an inditement. Target cross, you might see on the backs of every journalist and every publisher who puts out information that might be embarrassing to the government.
In fact, the very ones who put out the information from Chelsea Manning that Assange distributed to the newspapers, that includes The New York Times and really everybody who dealt with it on The New York Times and many other newspapers. And yet we have the fact. So this involves an actual destruction of the First Amendment, freedom of the press, protection to journalists. If this is carried on if he's both extradited and prosecuted, and if so, under the current state of court decisions over recent years, he would almost certainly be convicted and probably to life imprisonment.
He's facing charges that add up to 175 years. My 12 felony counts 50 years ago only added up to 115 years, but in both cases, it would be effectively a life sentence. So that's what journalists are facing here. And they don't seem to notice that.
Paul JayThere's been reports that during the Obama administration, they looked into whether to pursue the charges against Assange and they came to the conclusion that if they went forward with it, they would open the door to going after The New York Times and other papers that released the Manning revelations about war crimes in Iraq. Despite the fact that Obama went after many whistleblowers, in this case, they decided would be the end of investigative journalism if they extradited and charged Assange. So they decided not to pursue it, but Trump decided that he would.
Daniel EllsbergThat's been raised very much in these hearings. And the fact is he kept the grand jury open and the grand jury. But it was reported in 2013, seven years ago, that they decided not to prosecute him because that would the same charges would obviously apply to The New York Times. Well, Trump was so desperate from the very beginning. It turns out we've now learned from the very beginning in January of his term to get Julian Assange. And that's when this illegal surveillance of Julian Assange began with audio recordings of every conversation of his with everybody, including all of his legal conversations, clearly should rule out any kind of legal proceedings against him.
That's the impossibility of getting a fair trial, as my judge said in dismissing the charges after discovering on warrantless illegal wiretapping of me and other events, including an attempt to incapacitate me, to kill me at that time. He defends his sense of justice and he dismissed all charges. Obviously, we haven't mentioned this, but just in the last two days now, there has been sworn testimony unchallenged by the prosecution. Now It doesn't mean to admit it, but they refused to cross-examine or challenge it.
Exactly the same kind of abuses were done against Julian Assange, illegal surveillance, in this case, all his legal conversations. We don't know that in my case may have happened, but I don't have proof of it. But but definitely of me which they had denied for over a year falsely, that they had such overhearing. It also turned out, of course, that they had tried to incapacitate me or kill me in 1972 in the midst of my trial proceedings.
In this case, we have testimony that there was a consideration and discussion with the CIA of poisoning Julian Assange, essentially saying. They weren't trying to poison me, they were going to beat me to death or any way to silence me. At that point, they wanted to silence Julian Assange necessarily by poisoning. Now, this is sensational testimony about the CIA. It's given by people who actually operated performed these surveillance operations and participated in the discussion or overheard of the poisoning from the CIA, which clearly would go to the White House in the investigation, almost surely would show that the CIA wasn't doing that on their own. They were doing it at the behest. In fact, they said the highest authorities, highest circles were desperate to do this. And there hasn't been, to my knowledge, testimony like that in a court since my case. And I can tell you that when it came out in my case, the newspaperman could not have been more excited, dashing for the payphones to inform their home offices that Watergate, which was going on then, had reached the Pentagon Papers case, which before that had been very boring to them. And they felt out of the action. There was a lot of attention to it, ultimately figured in the impeachment proceedings against Richard Nixon, which led him to resign and made the Vietnam War and double in nine months, which could not have happened without this process in which many people participated.
OK, that's the same thing as pointing to the White House right now, certainly to the CIA, almost surely to the White House. And there hasn't been a word about it in The New York Times or The Washington Post.
There was one AP dispatch about it about a day or two ago. The Guardian, the British Guardian which shows in the United States as well, has covered this pretty well as they should, because if Julian Assange is guilty, Alan Rusbridger of The Guardian or the Observer, people are obviously as indictable. And just this morning, I heard a British lawyer say the law has always been pointed at British journalists with their Official Secrets Act, but with restraint, very few cases actually brought.
He said if this case is part of the United States, they will imminently, the British will imitate that immediately and the British journalists will feel the weight of that immediately. They'll imitate the United States, strictly speaking.
Now we're talking about the U.S. doing this to a British I'm sorry, an Australian citizen now also an Ecuadorian citizen, not an American.
If Julian can be extradited for putting out the information that The New York Times did, we interviewed in El Pais and Le Monde also did. No journalist in the world is safe from being kidnapped in the United States to face life imprisonment for putting out information like Chelsea Manning. And a lot of them put out Chelsea Manning's read the news that he's been charged with. But anything like that, there should be worldwide attention to it. And there is some certainly in Britain, none in the United States, in the mainstream press, you have to go to programs like this or Consortium News or Kevin Stoller's blog and others to learn that this case has been going on.
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