Where in the world is Edward Snowden? It’s the question on everyone’s mind after the National Security Agency whistleblower leaked classified information to The Guardian newspaper earlier this month showing that the government was secretly collecting telephone data on millions of Americans.
The story has become a worldwide news sensation, filled with all the plot turns and international intrigue of a James Bond film. In an attempt to contain the fallout from the NSA leak, elected officials and mainstream media have now begun to attack the work of investigative journalists like Glenn Greenwald, the reporter from The Guardian who broke the story and interviewed Snowden in his Hong Kong hotel room.
“I think its been shameful for the mainstream media to suggest that he is performing criminal acts when he is performing acts of journalism. If we had more journalists acting like Greenwald, we would probably have a more robust democracy,” said Josh Levy, Internet campaign director for Free Press, a national advocacy organization, to Mint Press News.
Journalism ethics and media laws
The saga began earlier this month when The Guardian reported that former Booz Allen Hamilton employee Edward Snowden leaked classified NSA documents revealing an anti-terrorism operation created to aggregate telephone metadata for millions of Americans. Although authorities weren’t actually listening in on conversations, they were collecting information including the duration of calls, cell phone locations and telephone numbers.
As Snowden travels from Hong Kong through Russia on his way to Ecuador, the Los Angeles Times reports that federal prosecutors have filed charges against Snowden for violating the Espionage Act. The usefulness and legality of Snowden’s actions have created a sharp divide in public discourse, with some supporting the NSA program as legitimate intelligence-gathering and others decrying it as a blatant violation of citizen privacy. Where does Greenwald, the reporter, stand in all of this?
Instead of praising Greenwald for quality investigative journalism, elected officials and members of the mainstream media have jumped to accuse him of “aiding and abetting” a wanted criminal.
David Gregory, the host of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” set off a firestorm with a single question last week: “To the extent that you have aided and abetted Snowden, even in his current movements, why shouldn’t you, Mr. Greenwald, be charged with a crime?”
Greenwald responded combatively, saying, “I think its pretty extraordinary that anybody who would call themselves a journalist would publicly muse about whether or not other journalists should be charged with felonies. The assumption in your question, David, is completely without evidence. The idea that I’ve aided and abetted him in any way… If you want to embrace that theory it means that every investigative journalist in the U.S. who works with their sources, who receives classified information is a criminal.”
For commentators and journalism professors, the phrase “aid and abet” is problematic because it implies a degree of criminal responsibility that remains unproven.
“I have no objection to David Gregory asking tough questions about the journalist’s role in a case like this. What I have a problem with are the words, ‘aid and abet,’ that sort of formulaic language for a certain kind of legal responsibility. The question was not cast in a kind of an open-ended, neutral frame. It was badly asked in the language of law and criminality,” said Roy Peter Clark, senior scholar at Poynter Institute, to Mint Press News.
The Poynter Institute, located in St. Petersburg, Fla., provides training and resources for journalists, including courses on journalism ethics and laws.
Greenwald has repeatedly denied that he aided or abetted Snowden in his fight to avoid criminal extradition and criminal prosecution.
It hasn’t slowed the public officials who are calling on the Obama administration to charge Greenwald with crimes for doing work that free press advocates believe is legitimate and within the law.
“I’m talking about Greenwald. Greenwald, not only did he disclose this information, he has said that he has names of CIA agents and assets around the world and they’re threatening to disclose that. The last time that was done in this country we saw a CIA station agent murdered in Greece. No right is absolute and even the press has certain restrictions,” said Rep. Peter King (R-NY) in a Fox News interview. King sits on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.
It all points to the erosion of constitutionally protected press freedoms. Instead of asking critical questions of the Obama administration and the NSA, NBC news and other major news outlets appear to be moving in lockstep with Obama administration talking points. The key question is, “Why are mainstream news outlets attacking Greenwald for doing his job?”
It could be the uncomfortably close relationship that has developed among large news agencies and the White House in recent years.
“It points to a problem,” Levy said. “They [news agencies] are too close to power. They are all too willing to stand up for the powerful because they see this as their continuing all-access pass to big stories.”
“It reminds me of when Vice President Joe Biden had journalists for a water gun fight on the Fourth of July. It shows a lack of distance between the press corps and the White House. I think it points to a larger structural problem,” he said.
The incident Levy references happened in 2010, when journalists frolicked on the White House lawn, shooting water guns with the vice president in an exchange that some considered both unprofessional and indicative of a “buddy-buddy” relationship with the Obama administration.
National security
Is there a limit to disclosure of information that could undermine national security? It’s a tightrope that news agencies have to walk every time they publish a sensitive story containing leaked information.
“In terms of the role of the journalist who receives certain documents or gains access to classified documents, I think there is a tremendous amount at stake when any journalist is working in this area. In one sense, if the abuses of power are great, there is no greater role that the journalist can play than to call attention to abuses of power and start of conversation for reform. However, in a field of national security with the Boston bombing and even 9/11 still quite fresh in our consciousness, we would never want to be seen as doing work that would undercut the country’s ability to protect itself against terrorism. That’s the high-wire act that Greenwald is walking right now,” Clark said.
Greenwald and The Guardian have not published the names and locations of CIA agents, nor have they announced plans to do so.
Unlike WikiLeaks, which publishes all leaked documents regardless of security implications, the Daily Beast reports that Greenwald and The Guardian have shown discretion by publishing just enough to shine a light on nationwide privacy issues without actually undermining national security interests.
Toward this end, Greenwald claims that he has no plans to publish the technical specifications of NSA systems or other information that clearly would advance the work of foreign intelligence agencies or terrorist groups abroad.
“I do not want to help other states get better at surveillance,” Greenwald said. “We won’t publish things that might ruin ongoing operations from the U.S. government that very few people would object to the United States doing.”
“If I’m hearing them correctly, they have published just enough to call into question the responsibility of those in power and raised in a practical way a more enlightened conversation about the balance between security of privacy,” Clark said.
Additionally, quality news agencies already have mechanisms in place to vet controversial information.
“Reputable news sources like The Guardian and The Washington Post have standards in place. They differ from news organization to news organization, but they are in place to make sure news is accurate and to make sure news doesn’t threaten national security. I am not going to question the validity of those standards but I do think that agencies like the NSA tend to call almost every leak a threat to national security because they are incredibly paranoid when it comes to leaks. I think that we need to be skeptical to claims of national security,” Levy said.