In one of his several appearances on TV on Wednesday morning, Secretary of State John Kerry went on the offensive over so-called NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and his appearances in the media, particularly regarding his remarks to NBC’s “Nightly News” anchor Brian Williams over his role with the NSA.
Kerry laid down a challenge to Snowden on “CBS This Morning,” suggesting that he come back to the United States and make his case within the U.S. justice system if he feels as strongly as he does.
“It’s the same disclosure that everybody’s known,” Kerry said. “You know, he very cleverly wraps it into the language, ‘I was a technical person. I didn’t go out there and work with humans, other people. I wasn’t working and interacting with human beings.’ Basically he was doing computer stuff and that was exactly what he says. So he wraps it into this, you know, larger language. The bottom line is this man has betrayed his country, who is sitting in Russia, an authoritarian country where he has taken refuge. You know, he should man up and come back to the United States.”
“If he has a complaint about what’s the matter with American surveillance, come back here and stand in our system of justice and make his case,” Kerry continued. “But instead he’s sitting there taking pot shots at his country, violating the oath that he took when he took on the job he took, and betraying, I think, you know, the fundamental agreement that he entered into when he became an employee. And the fact is he has damaged his country very significantly in many, many ways. Has hurt operational security, he has told terrorists what they can now do to be able to avoid detection. And I find it sad and disgraceful.”
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