NSA surveillance leaksLawmakers criticize NSA leaker Edward Snowden
Lawmakers were quick to criticize Edward Snowden, the 29-year old Booz Allen Hamilton employee who disclosed the NSA surveillance program to the Guardian and the Washington Post. House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Rogers (R-Michigan) said the national security leaks would endanger American lives. Peter King (R-New York), chairman of the Homeland Security subcommittee on Counterintelligence and Terrorism, said of the leaks: “This is a matter of extraordinary consequence to American intelligence.”
Snwden (above) is the target of a nomber of lawmarkers // Source: commons.wikimedia.org
Lawmakers were quick to criticize Edward Snowden, the 29-year old Booz Allen Hamilton employee who disclosed the NSA surveillance program to the Guardian and the Washington Post.
Rep. Peter King (R-New York.) on Sunday called for the prosecution of Snowden.
“If Edward Snowden did in fact leak the NSA data as he claims, the United States government must prosecute him to the fullest extent of the law and begin extradition proceedings at the earliest date,” King said in a statement.
The Hill reports that King, chairman of the Homeland Security subcommittee on Counterintelligence and Terrorism, also called on other countries to deny Snowden asylum.
“The United States must make it clear that no country should be granting this individual asylum.”
“This is a matter of extraordinary consequence to American intelligence,” King added.
On the Sunday talk shows, several lawmakers called for the prosecution of the leaker, even before his name came to light.
House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Rogers (R-Michigan) said the national security leaks would endanger American lives.
Rogers had harsh words for the leaker and for the journalist who first reported the NSA’s collection of phone records, the Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald.
Greenwald “doesn’t have a clue how this thing works; neither did the person who released just enough information to literally be dangerous,” Rogers said on ABC’s “This Week,” adding, “I absolutely think [the leaker] should be prosecuted.”
Rogers said the leaker had other ways to bring about a change in policy.
“He could come to the committees, if they had concern. We have IGs that they can go to in a classified way if they have concern,” he said.
The Washington Post reports that current and former U.S. intelligence officials said the revelation of Snowden’s role in the leaks would lead to a broad re-examination of security measures at the CIA and NSA, and te contactors working with these agencies.
“This is significant on a number of fronts: the scope, the range. It’s major, it’s major,” John Rizzo, former general counsel of the CIA, who worked at the agency for decades, told the Post. “And then to have him out himself . . . I can’t think of any previous leak case involving a CIA officer where the officer raised his hand and said, ‘I’m the guy.’ ”
James Clapper, director of national intelligence, in an interview with NBC that aired Saturday night, condemned the leaker’s actions but also sought to spotlight the journalists who first reported the programs, calling their disclosures irresponsible and full of “hyperbole.” Earlier Saturday, he issued a statement accusing the media of a “rush to publish.”
“For me, it is literally — not figuratively — literally gut-wrenching to see this happen because of the huge, grave damage it does to our intelligence capabilities,” Clapper said.
Senator John McCain (R-Arizona), said that he was not bothered by the surveillance. He said on the CNN program “State of the Union” that the terror threat was growing steadily amid deepening turmoil in the Middle East and North Africa but that further Congressional and executive review of the programs was “entirely appropriate.”
Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Dianne Feinstein (D-California) agreed that whomever leaked the information should be prosecuted, and she sought to beat back media reports suggesting that the Obama administration overplayed the impact of the programs.
The New York Times reports that Feinstein cited two declassified cases in which electronic surveillance data had been used — that of David C. Headley, an American who conducted several missions to Mumbai, India, in preparation for a deadly terror attack there, and that of Najibullah Zazi, an Afghan-American who was convicted of seeking to set off backpacks full of explosives in the New York subway. The Mumbai attack was carried out and killed more than 160 people; the subway attack was foiled.
Feinstein said there were other cases in which the NSA surveillance programs helped prevent terrorist attacks in the United States and abroad, but that she could not discuss them becasue they were still classified.
