“I decided to dedicate my life to defending whistleblowers”
Meet Jesselyn Radack, the lawyer defending the country’s top whistleblowers
AJ+: Can you start by telling us where you work and what you do?
Jesselyn Radack: I’m the director of National Security and Human Rights at the Government Accountability Project, which is the nation’s leading whistleblower organization. I provide legal representation and advocacy for whistleblowers, particularly those in national security and intelligence.
I came to this line of work after I blew the whistle on government misconduct in the prosecution of the so-called American Taliban, John Walker Lindh, who was our first prisoner in the war with Afghanistan. I happened to be the ethics officer on duty at the Department of Justice that day when I fielded a call about his capture and the government’s desire to interrogate him without counsel.
I advised that he needed to be permitted to speak to his attorney before being interrogated. When the FBI disregarded that advice and the advice ended up being withheld from the court in his criminal case, I blew the whistle.
For blowing the whistle I ended up being the target of one of the first criminal leak prosecutions. I was blacklisted and was put on the no-fly list.
AJ+: Can you talk about how you made the decision to disclose this government wrongdoing?
Jesselyn Radack: I was just trying to correct a wrong. There was an American who was facing the rest of his life in jail or the death penalty, and evidence that could have helped him had been withheld improperly by the Justice Department. So I went to the judge in the case and he said that I no longer had standing because I no longer worked at the Justice Department and then eventually, I went to the media, after which they did an article and the case quickly settled.
AJ+: Were you put under government surveillance after you blew the whistle?
Jesselyn Radack: When I first blew the whistle it was very disconcerting to find myself under surveillance. Although it wasn’t constant, when it did happen, it was deeply disturbing to see someone in a suit going through the trash in my backyard or to see a large black vehicle idling for hours in front of my house.
I just kept thinking, I don’t want anyone taking pictures of my home or my kids or me without my permission. I don’t want people reading my stuff even if I threw it away. At the time I was pregnant and I had two very small children, and it felt very invasive and very intimidating and that was what it was supposed to feel like.
But compared to the level of surveillance of other clients and the technology that has evolved since the time that I was under criminal investigation, the surveillance techniques today are so much more invasive.
AJ+: In your personal experience representing whistleblowers, what consequences have you seen them face?
Jesselyn Radack: Of the whistleblowers I represented, the first to be charged criminally was Thomas Drake. I knew we had crossed the Rubicon because normally, the whistleblowers I represent were facing having their security clearance pulled or being transferred or at worst being fired, but now here was someone who went through all the proper channels who was being charged criminally and being charged under the Espionage Act, which is the most serious charge you can level against an American. Tom blew the whistle on gross abuse and malfeasance, including secret surveillance done by the NSA, and he faced spending the rest of his life behind bars.
CLICK THE IMAGE BELOW TO LEARN MORE ABOUT NSA WHISTLEBLOWER THOMAS DRAKE:
Eventually, all charges against him were dropped. And he pled to a minor misdemeanor. I thought at that point that this was a one-off odd case, but shortly after, we had more indictments of people for allegedly mishandling allegedly classified information in the case of John Kiriakou who also, like Tom Drake, revealed one of America’s biggest scandals. In Tom’s case, it was secret surveillance, and in John’s case, it was the CIA torture program. John revealed that we were engaged in torture. So two of the biggest scandals of my generation — the people who blew the whistle on them were the people who ended up getting prosecuted for espionage.
The Obama administration has been brutal on whistleblowers. You have the disclosures of Chelsea Manning and of Jeffrey Sterling and of Stephen Kim and finally of Edward Snowden, all of whom revealed information that was in the public’s interest to know. All of whom the United States alleged created grave harm that they could never specify, and all of whom ended up being charged or prosecuted or convicted under the Espionage Act.
AJ+: What kind of special insight do you have into whistleblowers, having been one yourself? How does this inform the work that you do?
Jesselyn Radack: After going through what I went through, I decided to dedicate the rest of my life to defending whistleblowers, and I feel like it informs the work I do. Most people, when you’re going through this, it’s very surreal, and I have clients who walk in here and say: You’re never going to believe what I have to tell you. I can actually look them in the eye and say, yes, I will. And I do.
