Ex-officials who were prosecuted and had their lives upended for
allegedly mishandling sensitive records are accusing the Obama
administration of a "double-standard" in its approach to the Hillary
Clinton email scandal.
This administration has charged more people under the Espionage Act, a
World War I-era law once used to go after major breaches, than any
other in history. While the FBI is looking into Clinton's server amid
revelations of state secrets potentially passing through it, some
critics -- including those charged under that act -- doubt the
Democratic presidential candidate will get the same treatment.
"It's a double standard," said John Kiriakou, a former CIA
counter-terrorism operative who spent two years in federal prison and
three additional months under house arrest this year for leaking the
name of a covert CIA official involved in "enhanced interrogation
techniques."
Clinton is not accused of leaking. But the common thread in these
cases is the handling of classified material. And the slow-moving arc of
the email scandal -- marked by a trickle of revelations along with a
web of evolving explanations -- stands in stark contrast to past cases
where leakers and whistleblowers were punished aggressively.
Kiriakou, one of those defendants, sees different treatment for the Democratic powerhouse who led the State Department.
"The FBI is going to investigate [Hillary Clinton], but it is not up to them," he told FoxNews.com.
"If they [the FBI] want to charge Hillary Clinton with a crime, they
can certainly find a crime with which to charge her," he added. "But
there is no way the Obama administration is going to prosecute her. No
way."
Thomas Drake,
a former NSA official who after 9/11 went to Congress to sound the
alarms about what he called unconstitutional surveillance, also says
there is a double standard when it comes to applying classification
law.
"I got hammered good," Drake told FoxNews.com.
Though the government's Espionage Act case against him fell apart in
2011, Drake practically lost everything and faced a mountain of legal
bills. He pleaded to a single misdemeanor for "exceeding authorized use
of a government computer," a violation he compares to "spitting on the
NSA sidewalk."
"I think [Clinton] is vulnerable, but whether she enjoys what I call
'elite immunity,' we don't know," he said. "For much lesser violations
people have lost their jobs. But when you get to the higher ranks, it's
like another set of rules."
Since Obama took office in 2009, seven people have been charged under
the Espionage Act -- all for leaking classified or sensitive
information. Five -- Kiriakou, Shamai Leibowitz, Chelsea (previously
Bradley) Manning, Jeffrey Sterling, and former State Department official
Stephen Kim -- got jail time.
Kim pleaded guilty in 2014
to disclosing a classified report on North Korea to Fox News reporter
James Rosen. His lawyer said the information at issue "was less
sensitive or surprising than much of what we read in the newspaper every
day." He did 13 months in prison.
Sterling was sentenced
to three-and-a-half years in May for revealing classified information
about the CIA's effort to disrupt Iran's nuclear program to journalist
James Risen. Edward Snowden, who leaked hundreds of thousands of
documents on government surveillance, has been charged in absentia but
has asylum in Russia.
Whether Clinton will get "hammered" is another question. According to
reports, the FBI took possession of Clinton's private server last week.
The IG for the intelligence community told members of Congress that at
least two emails that traversed the device while she was secretary of
state contained information that warranted a "top secret" label.
Clinton and her staff have been adamant that no email marked
classified at the time was ever circulated through her email address or
server. "She viewed classified materials in hard copy in her office or
via other secure means while traveling, not on email," campaign
Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri said in an email to
supporters.
In his case, Kiriakou was charged with violating the Intelligence
Identities Protection Act, two counts of espionage, and making false
statements to the CIA Publications Review Board when writing his book,
"The Reluctant Spy." All but the first charge were dropped. He pleaded
guilty in exchange for a lesser sentence. But his wife, a top CIA
officer, was pushed out of her job. With three children at home, the
family went on welfare while Kiriakou was in prison, and fundraisers
helped pay the mortgage on their Arlington, Va., home.
To this day, his lawyer, Jesselyn Radack, insists the name of the
agent was already well known among the media and human rights community
and was never published. Radack told FoxNews.com the Clinton case is
"certainly indicative of the hypocritical double standard in Espionage
Act prosecutions brought against low-level employee versus
politically-connected people." She also lamented "over-classification"
and called the Espionage Act an "ill-fitting tool" in these cases.
According to The Washington Post, the Clinton investigation is now
being overseen by at least one prosecutor in the case of former Gen.
David Petraeus. Petraeus was charged with keeping classified information
at home in the form of secret "black books." He was given a two-year
probation and a $100,000 fine, and today, reportedly is consulting with
the White House on ISIS and Iraq and is the chairman of the KKR Global
Institute.
Drake, on the other hand, now works at an Apple Store.
"They aren't going to treat [Clinton] the same way I was treated for sure," he said.