Tuesday, April 26, 2016

Espionage Act and Journalists

Edward Snowden remains charged  with espionage under the Espionage Act of 1917. Chelsea Manning was found guilty of 20 counts relating to the transmission of state secrets under the same act. The act was passed nearly 100 years ago in the midst of World War 1 to prevent the selling of national secrets to enemy persons or countries. So why is the law presently being used to persecute citizens who released information to the American public? As the Obama administration pursued (and continues to pursue) this line of legal defense, what does that say about the state of journalism and journalists safety in the United States?

The Espionage Act of 1917 renders it a crime to hurt the US or benefit a foreign country by collection or communication information that could risk national defense and security. It also makes it a crime to obtain a document connected to the US's national defense; knowingly receiving classified information that was obtained illegally - and passing it on - is also prohibited. According to Steven Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy for the Federation of American Scientists, speaking to the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press in 2013, the act is "so vague and poorly defined in its terms, that it’s hard to say exactly what it does and does not cover,”

Before Manning's conviction, the US government had never before successfully prosecuted anyone other than a government employee for leaking classified information; Manning's conviction, in a sense, was unprecedented. As President Obama and the federal government filed charges against Snowden, the administration cited the Espionage Act more than all other previous administrations. Before Manning and Snowden, there remained a small chance that reporters would be convicted underneath the act. This confidence stemmed for the famous 1971 Pentagon Papers ruling in New York Times vs United States that stated the media can't be punished for publishing information that sources obtained illegally.

However, according to Alison Frankel in a 2013 piece for Reuters, there remains a distinction in the law between media's right to publish sensitive information and the government's theoretical right "to bring charges against reporters and publishers for possessing and disclosing classified information." Derigan Silver, DU professor, was cited in the same article asserting that there "remains a chill in the air that will not dissipate until journalists are protected when disseminating important information to the public." The pull of the Espionage Act, combined with at least three other federal laws that restrict information "present the risk that journalists could be prosecuted,” according to Silver. As the line between leakers and publishers blurs and definition of modern journalism expands, Silver asserts the risk of prosecution of journalists post-publish for revealing national security secrets "is likely to increase."

According to the watchdog advocacy group Reporters Without Borders, freedom of press across the globe decreased in 2015. 180 ranked countries experienced declines in freedom across different areas of the globe with Latin America posing as a matter of special concern.  Christophe Deloire, secretary general of the group, spoke with Agence France Presse claiming that "[a]ll of the indicators show a deterioration. Numerous authorities are trying to regain control of their countries, fearing overly open public debate." He continued, "it is increasingly easy for powers to appeal directly to the public through new technologies, and so there is a greater degree of violence against those who represent independent information,” According to Deloire, these global circumstances and indicators usher in a "new era of propaganda."

Given the recent events and trends, the Espionage Act has been serving as a legal web that allows the government to entrap journalists and their sources that convey information to the public beyond federal control. Our current hyper-focus on national security and preventative policies overtakes journalists' (and increasingly citizen journalists) function as a watchdog as the theoretical greater good is favored over the truth.

The recent successful leak of the Panama Papers rode on the anonymity of the source and encrypted methods and networks. Given the state of national security and policy today, when leaking damning information, it seems it is better to be anonymous than a journalist.


1 comment:

  1. Your last line really stuck with me: it seems it is better to be anonymous than a journalist. It's interesting to think about that in light of Snowden's rationale (though he wasn't reporting on the leaks himself) to go public, too. Combating secrecy with secrecy doesn't seem like a healthy scenario, but I'm not so sure how else journalists might navigate these murky circumstances. Nice post!

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