There has been a lot of water under the bridge since 2013 when CBS News first publicly announced the forensic evidence proving I was victimized by a long-term, remote effort to illegally spy on me and my CBS work through my computers. (You can watch the original news story in the video attached).
A half dozen independent forensics exams later, with uninvited government IP addresses definitively identified as pathways into my computers, with forensic testimony from a former NSA specialist, with a sworn statement of confirmation from a former FBI Unit chief, and with a former federal agent confessing to being part of the government’s illegal spy operation against me and many other U.S. citizens, it is reasonable to ask: Is the Department of Justice (DOJ) alarmed by the shocking injustices and crimes? Is DOJ interested in holding accountable the federal agents who are responsible? Is DOJ concerned with making sure the activity has stopped and does not happen to others?
Apparently not.
Going on seven years now, the DOJ remains precisely where it started: in huddle down and cover up mode. Rather than acknowledge the forensic evidence and dig deeper to identify all of the agents who touched the illegal operation and all of the victimized Americans, and rather than being incensed by the confession of a former federal agent who admitting spying on me, DOJ has used unlimited taxpayer dollars to block pursuit of the facts.
In a just or fair system, the DOJ would not have searched for legal excuses to dismiss the lawsuit I filed to bring the abuses to light… in fact, there would be no need for me to pursue a civil court case because the DOJ would have already prosecuted the guilty parties.
Yet here we are.
The fact is, DOJ is the entity that is supposed to administer law and order in our country. DOJ should be prosecuting the guilty federal agents. Yet DOJ officials were the ones who employed and tasked the guilty federal agents.
As Senator Ron Johnson pointed out in a recent letter to the DOJ and FBI, both agencies have stonewalled for six years refusing to answer basic questions about the intrusions into my computers. Instead, when they have responded at all, it has been to avoid the questions and replace them with answers to questions never asked.
It is no surprise to me that the Inspector General recently flagged FBI and DOJ officials for egregious misconduct involving government surveillance of former Trump campaign associate Carter Page, that an FBI lawyer allegedly doctored documents to wiretap Page, that DOJ has had to admit at least two wiretaps against Page should never have been granted, and that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court belatedly ruled the wiretaps were invalid. All of that is a little late. Page cannot recover his privacy or his reputation.
We could have seen this coming had we paid attention to the red flags and demanded real accountability. We already knew DOJ secretly subpoenaed phone records of Associated Press reporters and surveilled then-Fox News reporter James Rosen. We had discovered that our own Director of National Intelligence James Clapper gave false testimony to Congress denying the government was conducting mass surveillance of tens of millions of Americans. We knew, thanks to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, that our intel community had granted itself wide latitude to spy on U.S. citizens suspected of nothing at all through tactics such as “incidental” surveillance. We knew that communications of U.S. political figures were captured by intelligence officials and improperly leaked to the press. Incredibly, we even knew the CIA had gotten into computers of Senate Intelligence Committee staffers, though CIA head John Brennen initially denied it. Brennan and Clapper eventually apologized for the lapses. A little late for that, too.
It is becoming more obvious than ever how all of this fits together. Also obvious is the likelihood that the abuses we know about today are only a small slice of what may have really occurred — and what may continue to occur. It would explain the otherwise inexplicable double standards we are growing accustomed to. DOJ leaves no stone unturned pursuing the likes of Carter Page as a Russian spy only to have their suspicions revealed to be a figment of their imaginations. Yet provable crimes happening right under their own noses, sometimes committed by their own agents, are conveniently deposited down a memory hole like they never even happened.
It is in the hands of an independent news media to hold the powerful accountable. They could press until the abuses are addressed, the perpetrators held accountable, and the guilty brought to justice. But there is no such interest.
I have a feeling that if Trump administration intel officials ever got accused of illegally spying on journalists and hundreds of citizens through an illegal operation via computers, even without the forensics we have, even without the confession we have, it would still make international news and the media would not let go of it until heads really did roll. As for me? I was unlucky on two counts: I got targeted by the government in the first place, and I was spied on by an administration whom the press did not wish to admit would do such an unthinkable thing.
I once read about an ancient form of government whose premise was that an orderly society was only possible if its citizens had confidence that the law would be applied equally to the poorest and richest among them. Things would devolve into chaos if the citizenry came to believe people were held to different standards or escaped accountability depending on their power or status. Considering the course of my case, it is hard to look at our system today and not wonder if we are reaching that point.
A few years ago, several members of Congress who were concerned about intelligence community abuses told me they had been convinced not to call for wholesale reforms and heads-on-a-platter by the argument that it would “undermine the public’s faith in our institutions.” I think there is a strong argument to be made that the public is losing faith in our institutions because it sees double standards and absence of accountability.
As incredible as it seems, all of our forensic proof, expert testimony and even the confession may not matter. The way the game is played, a jury may never have the chance to see any of that simply because the other side has more lawyers, deeper pockets and all the power. However, we are exhausting all avenues and remedies, looking for glimmers of hope, and continuing to expose the facts— because the fight is too important.
But we know one thing for certain: the abuses surrounding my case are deeply symbolic. It they are dismissed and forgotten, we can certainly expect more of the same.
