The four remaining Espionage Act charges against drone whistleblower Daniel Hale that US prosecutors refused to drop were dismissed with prejudice by Judge Liam O'Grady. And just about all of the coverage of Hale's sentencing didn't report this remarkable development.
It unfortunately wasn't acknowledged in the report from @etuckerAP nor was it in @joshgerstein's coverage. It wasn't in @rachelweinerwp's coverage for Washington Post either. It isn't mentioned in The Intercept's coverage by @rdevro and @MazMHussain. And I missed it initially.
Only because I interviewed @ChipGibbons89 after sentencing did I learn that the four remaining Espionage Act charges were dismissed. But I wasn't able to attend court proceedings while these other media organizations did have reporters present.
No, @etuckerAP, it was not a foregone conclusion for Daniel Hale. He didn’t know on the eve of sentencing what would happen to the four remaining Espionage Act charges. Thanks for playing!
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Drone whistleblower Daniel Hale will be sentenced within the next hour, and if the US government has its way, he will receive the harshest sentence ever issued against someone for releasing documents without government authorization to the press.
THREAD will follow sentencing
Daniel Hale, who was involved in drone program while in US Air Force and deployed to Afghanistan: "The most disturbing thing about my involvement in drones is the uncertainty if anybody that I was involved in 'kill or capture' was a civilian or not. There's no way of knowing."
US prosecutors say Daniel Hale shared documents with a reporter for "self-aggrandizement," and it was not to inform American citizens. But @soniakennebeck, director of "National Bird" (in which Daniel appeared), wrote a letter to the court that counters this attack.
Drone whistleblower Daniel Hale’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for 9 am (ET) on July 27. Notice he will come before the judge and have to wait for plea agreement hearing. Then he and his defense will have a very limited time to address the court.
Daniel Hale will have no time to go past the window given to him. There are four defendants waiting to go before Judge Liam O’Grady at 10 am (ET).
A federal court is about to put its stamp of approval on harshest sentence ever issued against former government employee or contractor responsible for “unauthorized disclosure” of information, and it will likely be one of shortest Espionage Act sentencing hearings
Ahead of sentencing on July 27, drone whistleblower Daniel Hale penned a letter to the judge highlighting his experiences with US drone strikes in Afghanistan and how he "came to violate the Espionage Act."
Hale describes his role in the US military's drone program, when he was deployed to Afghanistan. He tracked down "the geographic location of handset cellphone devices believed to be in the possession of so-called enemy combatants."
Hale recounts first time he witnessed US drone strike.
"I could only look on as I sat by and watched through a computer monitor when a sudden terrifying flurry of Hellfire missiles came crashing down, splattering purple-colored crystal guts on the side of the morning mountain."
Saudi Arabia was temporarily prohibited from using Pegasus after Jamal Khashoggi was murdered. Then the Israeli government urged the NSO Group to "reconnect" the spyware for the Kingdom. theguardian.com/world/2021/jul…
What countries using NSO Group's Pegasus all have in common is they have "trade relations with Israel" or diplomatic ties that have improved.
Apartheid government of Israel bears responsibility for stories of repression against journalists and activists we're reading.
Use of Pegasus spyware made it possible for Morocco to target Algerians, mostly diplomats, in:
Angola
Belgium
Canada
Côte d’Ivoire
Czech Republic
Egypt
Ethiopia
Finland
Mauritania
Namibia
Nigeria
Rwanda
South Africa
Sweden
Switzerland
Syria
Tunisia
Turkey
Uganda
UAE
Zimbabwe
To mark #WorldPressFreedomDay, Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke about a "Khashoggi ban," where the US will impose visa restrictions on those acting on behalf of foreign government who suppress, harass, surveill, threaten, or harm journalists and/or their families.
When will UC Global director David Morales and others involved in the espionage operation against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange while he was in the Ecuador embassy face restrictions?
Agents within the CIA or other US intelligence institutions conspired against Assange and WikiLeaks during the Trump administration. They engaged in activities that involved harassment, surveillance, threats, or harm to Assange and his family. Can they be banned?