14 DAY TRIAL // The US House Intelligence Committee has released a report following a two-year-long investigation of Edward Snowden's leak of US secret documents, after fleeing the country for Hong Kong and then finding safe haven in the Russian Federation.
Officials released the report just one day before the premiere of a new Oliver Stone movie titled Snowden, a biopic of Edward Snowden's life and the events that led to his revelations and immediate consequences.
The House Intelligence Committee report was ordered in August 2014 by high-ranking US officials, well over a year after Snowden started releasing documents through selected journalists, in June 2013.
Report: Technically, Snowden can't be considered a whistleblower
The report, embedded at the bottom of this article in full, is a four-page summary of a larger 36-page document, which officials said will remain classified because it contains valuable details regarding US intelligence operations.
The published brief focuses on five key points that paint Snowden as a traitor and not a whistleblower.
First, officials say that the documents which Snowden stole had nothing to do with individual privacy interests, but were of great value to the Department of Defense's military, defense, and intelligence programs. Officials say those documents contained information that protected US troops abroad and revealed the US' cyber capabilities.
Second, they say Snowden can't be considered a whistleblower because revealing classified information does not classify you for this definition.
Report: Snowden was a liar and disgruntled employee
Third, officials say that Snowden was a disgruntled employee at best because two weeks before stealing NSA documents, he was reprimanded after engaging in a workplace spat with several NSA managers.
Fourth, officials say Snowden exaggerated and sometimes fabricated events. "Snowden's official employment records and [document] submissions reveals a pattern of intentional lying," the report says.
Fifth, and finally, the report blasts the NSA for not doing anything, three years after the fact, to better protect its systems.
Overall, the report paints Snowden in a negative light, somewhat to counteract the boost of public image he'll be receiving following Oliver Stone's new movie.
Three days ago, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Amnesty International, and the Human Rights Watch started a second campaign to raise signatures from US citizens and ask the White House to pardon Snowden after an initial campaign failed in 2015.