Impartial presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stated he stays dedicated to pardoning NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden on his first day in workplace if he’s elected to the White Home.
Kennedy Jr. launched a petition Monday calling on President Biden to pardon Snowden, who in 2013 famously visited Hong Kong and uncovered labeled NSA paperwork that exposed the U.S. authorities was spying on its residents. He was then charged with espionage and theft of presidency property.
“Snowden carried out a crucial public service by revealing to Individuals for the primary time that our authorities had been spying on us, thousands and thousands of law-abiding Americans, in violation of quite a few legal guidelines and of our basic proper to privateness,” Kennedy Jr. stated in a video connected to the petition.
Now a Russian citizen after looking for asylum, Snowden was stranded in Russia following the discharge of the paperwork after the U.S. authorities revoked his passport as he was making an attempt to make the journey to his supposed last vacation spot of Latin America, the place he had deliberate to remain to keep away from U.S. prosecution for taking 1000’s of labeled paperwork from the NSA and leaking them to the press. Snowden has not left Russia since.
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The knowledge included the mass assortment of Individuals’ metadata, permitting the federal government to see when and to whom a cellphone name or message was despatched.
The video additionally featured a compilation of feedback made by former Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump, all of whom criticized Snowden as a traitor.
“Previous to Edward Snowden, no person knew that the intelligence companies had been illegally mining all of our information and spying on Americans,” Kennedy Jr. stated. “So it is not stunning that those self same intelligence companies are actually attempting to painting Snowden as a felony and that captive politicians are supporting that narrative.”
“Edward Snowden is an American hero,” Kennedy Jr. continued. “As an alternative of jailing Snowden, I’ll construct a statue to him and possibly to [WikiLeaks founder] Julian Assange someplace close to the Washington Press Membership or maybe exterior the CIA headquarters in Langley as a civics lesson to the Republic.”
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The presidential hopeful has beforehand stated he would pardon Snowden and Assange, an Australian writer held in a most safety London jail and preventing extradition to the U.S. on espionage fees for publishing labeled navy paperwork in 2010.
“It is time that we return our authorities to the democratic and humanitarian beliefs that we have all the time represented as a nation,” Kennedy Jr. stated. “Let’s return to championing free speech and celebrating truth-tellers and the whistleblowers who put their careers and their very own freedom on the road to guard ours.”
Kennedy Jr. has lengthy been a critic of the U.S. intelligence companies.
After initially difficult Biden for the Democratic Get together’s presidential nomination, Kennedy Jr. launched a White Home bid as an unbiased in October, establishing a match-up towards Biden and Trump within the 2024 normal election.
Trump has beforehand stated he believes Snowden is a “whole traitor” and even advised as soon as that the whistleblower “needs to be executed.” Nonetheless, the previous president later admitted he thought of pardoning Snowden or Assange, who was indicted by Trump’s Justice Division, within the last days of his administration, though he didn’t specify which one.
“The America I like doesn’t punish whistleblowers,” Kenndy Jr. wrote in his petition. “Fact-tellers who champion free speech and attempt to return America to its democratic and humanitarian beliefs needs to be revered, not prosecuted.”