Glenn Greenwald says we live in a world in which liberals who “loved” his reporting on the dangers of the National Security Agency’s expansive power now mock Tucker Carlson’s claims that his communications were monitored.
The co-founder of The Intercept appeared on the Fox News host’s program Wednesday evening to give the issue historical context.
“It’s interesting,” Mr. Greenwald said. “When I did the reporting with Edward Snowden in 2013 and 2014, liberals loved that reporting so much that they gave us every award that they have to offer. The Pulitzer. The Polk. The film that was done about my work with Edward Snowden was given an Oscar. I went up on the Oscar stage. They couldn’t lavish enough prizes and praise on us. And now here we are, after the Trump years, and we know that the Democratic Party and journalism, in general, has aligned with the CIA, the NSA and the FBI, and has aligned and merged with the security state.”
Mr. Carlson insists that a whistleblower exposed NSA spying on his personal communications, which the agency denies.
“This allegation is untrue. Tucker Carlson has never been an intelligence target of the agency and the NSA has never had any plans to try to take his program off the air,” the NSA said in a statement posted Tuesday night.
Must Watch Segment About The Power Of The NSA@ggreenwald Joins Tucker Carlson To Discuss The NSA’s Surveillance Capabilities & The Mainstream Media’s Response To Tucker Carlson’s Reporting pic.twitter.com/2uR07EPPoE
— The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) July 1, 2021
Mr. Greenwald said the 180-degree turn by liberals on NSA surveillance has been fascinating to watch.
“You would think other journalists — just out of self-interest — even if they dislike your ideology and you, would say ’we want to know whether the NSA is abusing their powers in order to spy on journalists they dislike.’ And, instead, they mocked it,” Mr. Greenwald continued. “They said that, ’oh, he has to be paranoid in order to think this.’”
The journalist then pivoted to an analysis of the NSA’s denial.
“They took the NSA statement, Tucker, that I have seen over and over, over the last eight years, that is designed to mislead the public,” Mr. Greenwald said. “They use their carefully constructed words to say ’Tucker Carlson is not an intelligence target of the NSA,’ which may be true. But what that leaves out is that there are so many other ways that they have to spy on the communications of American citizens without making you a target, without getting a warrant. They have huge authorities that really haven’t been reined in since 2013 and 2014.”
The “Tucker Carlson Tonight” host’s Tuesday coverage was more succinct.
“The NSA has read my private emails without my permission, period,” he said. “That’s what we said. Today’s statement from the NSA does not deny that.”
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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