President Obama does not agree with the view of his former Attorney General Eric Holder that Edward Snowden performed a “public service” by leaking classified documents about the United States’ sweeping surveillance programs.
Holder, in an interview with CNN’s David Axelrod over the weekend, said Snowden’s illegal act had some silver linings for people by shining a light on U.S. surveillance techniques. But he also said the former contractor for the National Security Agency must pay a penalty for the crimes.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest was unequivocal in his response to a question on whether Obama agreed with Holder’s perception that Snowden’s actions had some redeeming qualities for the public.
“A careful review of [Obama’s] public comments will indicate that he does not” share Holder’s view, Earnest said.
“Everybody here who had the opportunity to work with Attorney General Eric Holder certainly respects his work, respects his view of the law,” Earnest said.
“I would point out that even Mr. Holder pointed out in that interview that ‘[Snowden] has broken the law, in my view. He needs to get lawyers. Come on back and decide — see what he wants to do — go to trial — try to cut a deal. There has to be a consequence for what he has done,'” Earnest recalled, quoting Holder from the CNN interview.
“It is what Mr. Holder is articulating there [that is the] view of the administration … that Mr. Snowden has been charged with serious crimes. He should return to the United States. He should be afforded due process, and that’s essentially how this situation should be handled,” he added.
During his CNN interview with David Axelrod, a former top aide to Obama, Holder said Snowden helped “raise the debate” over the surveillance techniques and bring about important changes to those once secret policies.
“We can certainly argue about the way in which Snowden did what he did, but I think that he actually performed a public service by raising the debate that we engaged in and by the changes that we made,” Holder, who helmed the Justice Department at the time of the Snowden leak, told Axelrod.
“Now, I would say that doing what he did, and the way he did it, was inappropriate and illegal,” Holder said, adding that Snowden harmed American security interests and the U.S. government’s ability “to keep American people safe.”
“There were all kinds of re-dos that had to be put in place as a result of what he did, and while those things were being done we were blind in certain really critical areas. So what he did was not without consequence,” Holder said.
He then said Snowden should return from Russia to deal with the consequences. But, he hinted that a judge should be more lenient considering the “usefulness” of Snowden’s leaks and the national debate over surveillance it generated.
“I think in deciding what an appropriate sentence should be, I think a judge could take into account the usefulness of having had that national debate,” he said.
During a separate University of Chicago Institute of Politics event earlier this month, Snowden, in video conference from Russia, said he would return to the U.S. if he could receive a fair trial. But he said he knows that the Espionage Act charges he faces do not allow for a “public interest defense.”
“You’re not allowed to speak the word ‘whistleblower’ at trial,” he said.
