OPINION:
In May 2013, Edward Joseph Snowden, a contractor working for the National Security Agency, illegally obtained — and then transferred to a handful of journalists — millions of highly classified documents detailing the inner workings of America’s leading intelligence agency. He then fled to Hong Kong and, later, Russia, where he presently resides.
Mr. Snowden is a traitor to the United States. But he, like all good confidence men, will plead that his action is the true model of patriotism, and that the so-called surveillance-state our country has become will only change when more people, like himself, expose the unsavory tactics of an unaccountable deep state.
And maybe he has a point. In a democracy such as ours, the tension between liberty and security is something that must carefully be watched and debated. But what Mr. Snowden did, by running overseas to China and then Russia and, we have to imagine, sharing his data trove with our two worst enemies, is the signal difference between someone who whistle blows out of a genuine concern for the liberty of his fellows, and a traitor, who means to harm his or her country.
Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, all recognize the traitor Mr. Snowden for who he is and what he has done. Former President Obama refused to pardon him. Current President Trump once called him “a spy who should be executed.” This is, in other words, a bipartisan issue.
And so, when, at a press conference last weekend, Mr. Trump noted “There are many, many people — it seems to be a split decision — many people think that he should be somehow be treated differently and other people think he did very bad things,” adding that “I’m going to look at it,” it naturally left many people wondering just what was going on.
On the one hand, the president has not exactly been treated fairly by the intelligence community. With each passing day some new revelation adds credence to Mr. Trump’s day-one assertion that the “Russiagate” controversy was essentially cooked up in an unaccountable deep state laboratory. That the majority of the American media, to say nothing of top-ranking former intelligence officials, went along — and fueled — what the president repeatedly refers to as the greatest witch hunt in American history, did not make things easier. In short, Mr. Trump has reason to be mad.
But if this anger, or spite, really, is the president’s attempt at retribution, he picked the wrong strategy.
Mr. Snowden is not your average American traitor. What he appears to have given away to our adversaries are nothing less than the crown jewels of our intelligence apparatus. The sheer quantity of data he released is mind-boggling. He did it with no care, no specific reform purpose. What he downloaded he gave away. He weakened, perhaps by decades, our national security defenses. He most likely got intelligence field officers killed. Mr. Snowden’s speaking fees are in the tens of thousands. He is now a millionaire.
So, we say to Mr. Trump, if you are seriously considering a pardon, to please reconsider. The message you are sending to would-be traitors is that you can perpetrate the biggest data theft of national security and the “law and order” president will forgive your sins as if you stole a piece of bubblegum.
Instead, Mr. Trump should consider his legacy. Just like he displayed a willingness to send in federal troops to support governors when protests got out of hand, he should showcase his toughness (and negotiating skills) by negotiating Mr. Snowden’s extradition to the United States for a fair trial. Not only is this the right thing to do, it may also provide a much-needed jolt to the campaign.
And if this was all in jest, it’s a bizarre kind of joke.
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