Will President Trump pardon Edward Snowden? I hope he does. Here’s why.
—-
Don’t miss the weekly video from Stossel TV. Sign up here: https://johnstossel.activehosted.com/f/1
—-
Because Snowden told the world that the NSA was spying on Americans, illegally, and lying to Congress about it, he faces jail if he returns to the US.
I talked with him via Zoom.
“I have not asked for pardon, from this president or the prior president. but many others have on my behalf and I’m tremendously grateful for that,” Snowden tells me.
He further explains why a pardon is possible now, even as people like former National Security Advisor John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo say he should be executed.
“Politicians say you should be killed,” I remind Snowden.
“As each year passes and all of those claims… you know, they were like, ‘oh, he got people killed. There were agents [killed]… Attacks are going to get through.’ None of it came to pass,” he points out.
That’s true, and so many people have changed their minds about him.
In 2013, Trump said of Snowden: “This guy is a bad guy, and there is still a thing called execution.”
But now Trump says he’d “look at” giving Snowden a pardon.
As Snowden tells me: “I think it’s clearer and clearer that what I did was the right thing to do. And in fact, public opinion is swinging very heavily toward that side… I think that’s because history has a way of exonerating the truth,” he says.
The video above is just a few minutes of a nearly 2-HOUR interview I did with Snowden. We’ll post more of it Tuesday.