August, 04 2017, 02:30pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
Sessions "Wrongly Targets National Security Whistleblowers"
Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats just held a news conference on leaks of classified information. See C-SPAN video.
WASHINGTON
Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats just held a news conference on leaks of classified information. See C-SPAN video.
Jesselyn Radack, director of the Whistleblower & Source Protection Program (WHISPeR) at ExposeFacts, stated today:
"The Justice Department's crackdown on leaks wrongly targets and punishes national security whistleblowers, who have no meaningful internal channels for dissent or meaningful protection from retaliation. The crackdown is a backdoor way of attacking journalists on whom the public relies to be informed about government misconduct.
"Insider Threat Programs have proven discriminatory against legitimate whistleblowers and foster a destructive, McCarthy-esque culture within the federal government.
"Attorney General Sessions fails to distinguish between whistleblowing in the public interest and other leaks and fails to address the rampant over-classification problem plaguing the national security community."
Background: see statement from April from Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg: "Trump Threats to WikiLeaks 'Nuclear Option' Against the First Amendment."
ExposeFacts.org is a project of the Institute for Public Accuracy.
For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 421-6858, David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
A nationwide consortium, the Institute for Public Accuracy (IPA) represents an unprecedented effort to bring other voices to the mass-media table often dominated by a few major think tanks. IPA works to broaden public discourse in mainstream media, while building communication with alternative media outlets and grassroots activists.
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