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Comment by ztratar | Hacker News Reader

I guess that's what happens when you leak classified information and then work with foreign adversaries.

Kind of interesting how people think this isn't espionage related. I would like to hear the argument that this is purely a first amendment case. Free speech doesn't cover the theft of dangerous, classified information and potentially treasonous activities.

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Or instead of describing Wikileaks publications as "theft" you could describe it as publishing whistle-blowers who are exposing illegal corruption (like the NSA spying case), and whistle-blowers are legally protected in many contexts.

N.S.A. Collection of Bulk Call Data Is Ruled Illegal https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/08/us/nsa-phone-records-coll...

This is in reply to @ztratar original comment which is now flagged and so I can't see it - where he was wondering why the Assange case was a first amendment issue.

IMO this is an excellent article that explores first amendment issues and the Assange case: https://theintercept.com/2019/04/11/the-u-s-governments-indi...

Side comment: while I totally disagreed with zratar's comments, not sure why he's flagged - which ends up being a form of censorship here. Can't imagine what he said was so offensive it had to disappear.

@buxtehude I agree with you, and while I also didn't agree zratar's comment I don't like the idea of it being hidden here as it's part of the conversation. I did "vouch" for his comment on that premise so maybe you can see it again.

Whistle-blowing is legally protected in many contexts, but not this one. There's a long continuum of things one is expected to try first -- from complaining to your boss, to reaching out to relevant oversight officials and Congress, to contacting the press -- before you simply send hundreds of thousands of documents to a foreigner working for a GRU propaganda laundry.

> foreign adversaries

He isn't a US citizen.

Additionally...

> Free speech doesn't cover the theft of dangerous, classified information and potentially treasonous activities.

Treason [noun]: The crime of betraying one's country, especially by attempting to kill the sovereign or overthrow the government.

He didn't betray his county. He's not a U.S. citizen.

He didn't try to kill any sovereign. The U.S. doesn't have a monarch, and to the best of my knowledge, he hasn't tried to assassinate any sitting president.

There is no evidence that the leaking of evidence of war crimes would overthrow the government. It would probably see a lot of people fired, but given the structure of the U.S. Government, it's nigh on impossible to overthrow a government. Even for something as egregious as war crimes.

So using the word treasonous is a stretch.

This is what I’m not getting. How can someone be indicted of espionage if this happened outside of the country? E.g. it’s not illegal to spy on the other countries from within the US.

Earlier you were flagged, so I could not reply to you directly, but I wanted to share with you an article which explores the first amendment issues and the Assange case which you should read: https://theintercept.com/2019/04/11/the-u-s-governments-indi...

The article explains how there is a very strong press freedom issue at play:

But in 2013, the Obama DOJ concluded that it could not prosecute Assange in connection with the publication of those documents because there was no way to distinguish what WikiLeaks did from what the New York Times, The Guardian, and numerous media outlets around the world routinely do: namely, work with sources to publish classified documents.

I'm sharing the same link a little lower - hope this isn't breaking any HN rules - but wanted to share it with you.

> potentially treasonous activities.

You do know he's not an US citizen don't you?

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