Title: The Legal Power Hour - with Second-Time Guest: John Kiriakou
Show: Stack The Legal Odds In Your Favor
Date: 2018-06-05
URL: https://youtu.be/J-YSYuGX7IE
Duration: 32:00

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[00:12] hello everyone and welcome once again to the legal Paulo alwah will we jam 60 minutes of thought provoking discussion into a 30 minute show designed to inform affect a fellow American citizens we are co-hosts Tom Scott and Sarah nahin Dee and today we are absolutely thrilled to have with us as I guess once again mr. John Kiriakou former CIA counterterrorism officer and get it for

[00:43] the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations whistleblower author and activist did I forget anything day adjoined know I once said that keeps me pretty busy I bet does it but I bet if that's what welcome once again to our show John thank you thanks for having me always happy to be with you thank you for coming back we had such a great show with you last time we were looking for you know having you on again so Thank You Klaus and if I viewers remember last

[01:16] last year we had you on the show we had a great discussion between then and now I noticed you've received the 2016 Sam Adams Award for integrity and it doesn't appear many people have received that award can you explain that and tell our view was about that award and what it entails sure Sam Adams is not the founding father Sam Adams this Sam Adams was a senior CIA analyst in the 1960s and early 1970s who was the first person really the only person to warn the White

[01:50] House that the Pentagon was lying about its numbers of Vietnamese troops and Vietcong troops that were fighting against us in the war the Pentagon for political reasons was under reporting those numbers Sam was Harvard educated he had advanced degrees in statistics and he was confident in his methodology of course history has proven him right but he paid for it with his career he was he was sort of shunted off into a do-nothing position he ended

[02:21] up my name from the CIA in 1971 and then died of a heart attack soon after he was only about fifty years old but many of his friends remained for their careers in the agency and when they finally retired and formed a group called veteran intelligence professionals for sanity they established the Sam Adams Award for integrity and intelligence it's been given out about a dozen times I want it last year sy Hersh won it this year a couple of years ago it was given to Ed

[02:52] Snowden so it's it's generally been given to people who have advanced the cause of truth and intelligence and who have paid a price for doing that I was I was humbled to receive it wow that's a big deal congratulations thank you I've got it I've got it in this cabinet right here it's it's a it's a candlestick is what it is because it's supposed to signify bringing light into

[03:25] the dark recesses of the intelligence community how did you feel about that and what was that like what was that experience like to receive that award oh I'll tell you when I got it I had just gotten out of prison and so it was you know prison does something to you whether you like it or not whether you whether you think that it's happening or not it it wears you down into a little nub and it doesn't matter if you think

[03:55] you were right or righteous it doesn't matter if you think that you were screwed by the government it doesn't matter if you think that you were set up for political reasons you still come out and most of society just looks at you as a convicted criminal you're a convicted felon so to be honored by my my colleagues and my peers from the CIA the FBI NSA homeland security NCIS it meant a lot to me you know it reminded me that I I did the right thing when I blew the

[04:26] whistle on the CIA's torture program and even though the price was high it was the right thing to do did it make it to make you feel like what you did wasn't in vain completely yeah you know what there have been a couple of things that made me conclude that what I did was not in vain you know the first thing was in December of 2015 this was five weeks before I was released from prison I called my wife and I said hey how was your day

[04:58] and she said my day was great I said yeah why and she said because the Senate torture report was released today and it proved that everything you said was true and that made me feel good I got out in February of 2015 and then in August of 2015 the McCain fine stein amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act was passed which expressly banned torture exactly the kinds of torture techniques that we were using against al-qaeda prisoners in 2002 and John

[05:29] McCain said that I was the inspiration for that amendment so that made it all worthwhile that's very nice recognized by it was it was well who's devoted his you know entire career to public service yes yes it was validating so John this that this is actually a ward from you appears then so that that's that really a would from management of high levels it was one thing but from peers the people you work with on a day-to-day basis that means a

[12:16] called my called my attorneys legal Titans and one of them told me recently he said you know I knew that Obama wasn't gonna pardon you because it was as though we were asking Obama to say my bad I shouldn't have I shouldn't have prosecuted him I'll pardon him you know sorry about that well that that was never gonna happen but he said you've been so clearly wronged by our government you're gonna get that part in one of these days it may not be with this president it may

[12:47] not even be with the next one but eventually you're gonna get that pardon I hopefully believe that that should happen and it would be a great miscarriage of justice if it didn't happen thank you very much so I hope it happens under this president thank you I hope so too like I say I have one Avenue into this White House and I I'm gonna either try if we could to one thing I'm not sure if our viewers have heard about

[13:18] Thomas Drake jessalyn rate act like the documentary I guess it was silenced the film directed by James Fiona um can you explain what's what the message is in that and how your role in the role of Thomas Drake and Jesslyn Wright AK Sheila whole thing together sure jessalyn react was one of my attorneys she had been the director of ethics in the Justice Department and in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks when John Walker Lindh the American Taliban was arrested he was

[13:51] arrested on a weekend and so FBI agents called the Justice Department from Afghanistan jessalyn was on duty and she answered the phone and they said we caught an American what do we do and she said the first thing you have to do is read him his rights right he has a constitutional right against self-incrimination they did not read him his rights and in fact he made confessions to criminal acts well a few

[14:21] days later when the Attorney General announced his arrest the Attorney General specifically said he had been read his rights and he waived them that was a lie so jessalyn went through the chain of command to lodge a complaint she was told to keep her mouth shut and instead she went to the press when she went to the press she was fired from the Justice Department but worse than that the Justice Department filed a complaint against her with the District of Columbia Bar Association to try to keep her from ever working as an attorney

[14:53] again and worse than that they put her on the no-fly list as a terrorist sympathizer in fact all she ever tried to do was to protect the constitutional rights of an American citizen she wasn't taking a position on John Walker Lindh politics she was just treating him like any other American in trouble now Tom Drake Tom was a senior executive at NSA the National Security Agency and Tom stumbled on to this program called

[15:24] thinthread where where Michael Hayden who at the time was the director of NSA had authorized a program to spy on American citizens now this is clearly unconstitutional and besides being unconstitution it's a violation of the NSA Charter which specifically forbids it from spying on American citizens Tom went through his chain of command he went to the Inspector General was told to mind his own business he went to the general counsel was told the same thing he went

[15:56] to the DoD inspector general because NSA is a DoD agency DoD actually destroyed the evidence that Tom brought out with him finally he went to the Congressional Oversight Committee he went to the house permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and reported this now this is the very definition of waste fraud abuse and illegality and instead what happened was the FBI charged Tom with nine felonies including seven counts of espionage well he hadn't committed espionage obviously he was working for

[16:27] the public good NSA was in violation of the law DoD inspector general was in violation of the law the case against him ended up falling apart and all of those felonies were dismissed but not before he cashed in his pension in order to pay his lawyer of bills he was arrested and fingerprinted and booked and finally released his wife left him because she was an NSA employee and the FBI said we're arresting your husband this morning you're either with us or you're with him she chose to be with the

[16:59] FBI and now here he is a national hero and the only work he can get is to work as a clerk in an Apple store in Bethesda Maryland so Jim spean is a is an Academy Award nominated documentary filmmaker when I was arrested he asked through jesselyn Radack if he could film me for the year leading up to my trial against my better judgment at the time and against the wishes of my entire legal team I agreed

[17:31] and I'm glad that I did Jim really was able to tell the story not just of my case but of jessalyn case and Tom's case and the unconstitutionality of so many of the different things that our government does in the in the false name of national security we were all I'm nominated for an Emmy Award last year which was like a bizarro kind of weird experience but here we are three people have been charged with a variety of

[18:02] national security crimes and none of us had committed national security crimes thank God none of us had been convicted of national security crimes and we found ourselves at the any Awards last year to you you know Jim's beyond I owe him a great deal he was he was really the only one who was able to get get our story out there for the American public and in fact the documentary has been so successful I think it's still on Netflix Amazon and iTunes it's called silenced Wow yeah do you have any idea I mean

[18:35] these stories are you know incredible and an unbelievable two people who just don't understand that these kinds of things happen and happen a lot in our legal system what I mean do you think that this has been happening for four decades and from the beginning of this country I mean this is coming and we don't know I mean no no no it's been happening since September 11th everything changed on September 11th and not for the better you know so many people were so more farsighted than I

[19:06] was because I believe that once we defeated al-qaeda we would get our September 10th country back and that just wasn't the case at all there were others in the national security structure at the National Security Council CIA NSA FBI Homeland Security who decided that no this this 9/11 attack this was a game changer that they were going to be able to do anything they wanted and it didn't matter if they didn't have a warrant it didn't matter if they didn't have they didn't have legal cause to for example intercept

[19:39] every email that every American rights or to intercept and put in a database every telephone call every text message that every American ever makes they have enough storage space between what would they have in a facility in Utah and a new facility there building outside of Fort Detrick Maryland they have enough storage space to hold this information for 500 years well that's not what the Constitution says they can do so the rest of us you know as Americans we have to stand up and we have to say

[20:10] this is wrong it's illegal and and we're not going to allow it do you think yours will ever go back to one surveillance state or not obviously once something like 9/11 happens you can never you can never go backwards but do you ever think that we will retract a little bit and and not be as much of a you know big brother kind of able to dull it a little bit and the only reason I say that is thanks to the revelations of event Snowden

[20:41] Congress has just now begun to act on some of these mass surveillance issues last year for example in the house and this originated in something called the freedom caucus and the House of Representatives which is it's a Republican caucus on the house side but it's very libertarian in its leanings they were the first ones to stand up for example to section 7 20 of the National Security Act allowing warrantless wiretapping they were the first ones to stand up and say that there ought to be

[21:11] a sunset provision to to the Patriot Act and by god there ought to be a sunset provision to the Patriot Act the Patriot Act should have to be renewed every single year because times change technology changes and public weal changes and I for one don't want my government spying on me or on anybody else not without probable cause and not without a warrant which is what the Constitution calls for yeah we we write about the USA patriot act in our book and you know we refer to

[21:42] the government's knee-jerk reaction after the CAF has already left the pen exactly right and the USA PATRIOT Act has militarized further militarized average police it's enabled more spying on him gets done everything that it was intended not to do and that's how laws that are passed recently since 9/11 as you say have become misused I mean the intent the USA PATRIOT Act the all there's a few we write about in our book

[22:13] but but inevitably you know these these laws further infringe of specifically 4th and 5th amendment rights as you just said and it's in its and is getting worse they absolutely do and it is getting worse I read recently that the Ohio State University campus police right the campus police for an American College recently took delivery of a tank for what reason what in the world is the Ohio State University

[22:44] Police Department going to use with a tank tanks are for killing people is that what they're going to do with it I doubt it so they shouldn't have that tank you know I read something fascinating a week or two ago to you know we've we've had somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,100 police killings into in 2017 this is the police shooting innocent people 1107 according to the American Civil Liberties Union the

[23:16] conclusion the reason that this has happened according to the ACLU is that the average American Police Department spends 90% of its time on shooting practicing shooting and different tactics and 10% of its time on negotiation training conversely in the UK there were 10 police shootings last year now this is this is a country with the same you know population as California roughly 10 police shootings

[23:49] but they spend 70 percent of their training time on negotiations and only 30 percent on shooting there's something for us to learn there yeah you know the whole thing with this this the police and the mentality in this country it does almost like a ratcheting effect you know the police become more aggressive right so people are less a more afraid of the police right so they become more more intimidated so they're more likely

[24:19] to react right and maybe even like all these police shooting shootings of the police themselves which makes the police more irritable and more trigger-happy which makes the people more afraid so you get this constant well the whole thing just explodes and I think that's what we seeing today right i mean how many police police shootings but the shootings of the police themselves and you know it's not condone it I don't I don't condone it whatsoever but certainly it's yeah I agree with you I agree with you but now we've got the point where we have communities in this

[24:51] country that see the police as an occupation force because they're all in black with with body armor and Kevlar they have advanced weapons I mean what are you supposed to conclude they're out to kill people that's what that's what Americans think now I mean especially if you're certain races and and people that are targeted I don't blame people for being scared of the place I mean it it's it is something to be feared I agree but

[25:24] there's feel I'm afraid of the police yeah yeah I hate to say I kind of am too yeah I am too and and there's fear on both sides and it's warranted given the fabula you know they carry guns and a lot of Americans carry guns and and guns are made for one purpose and one purpose only and they're made to kill people exactly that's it they're made to kill people so it's it's understandable that

[25:55] it shouldn't be happening and it shouldn't be happening the way it's happening and I hope that you know all these stories and all the information about the unnecessary and and brutal and you know police killings for no reason I mean I hope that that will make police departments change how they operate you know I think that the only thing that's going to make police departments change is police prosecutions when police departments realize that there is a

[26:26] price to pay when you shoot a man in the back for example who's running away from you after a traffic dispute or this terrible incident we had in Minnesota a couple of weeks ago where a woman called 9-1-1 because she heard somebody being beaten in the alley behind her house the policeman pulls up she out of her house to talk to the policeman he rolls down the window of his cruiser and shoots her point-blank range and kills her and then the district attorney said that he doesn't

[26:57] think that he has enough evidence to charge this cop in court well they're not gonna ever learn their lessons unless there's fallout legal fallout you can't just kill people with impunity at least you shouldn't be able to kill people with impunity there should be no blanket immunity right I mean people they need to be prosecuted if you kill somebody for no reason that was storming we do have a thing called involuntary manslaughter in this country so you don't charge it and prosecute it yeah

[27:28] like Sara says there should be no blanket immunity for police lawyers judges no blanket immunity whatsoever and one thing I can tell you is I would never call the police for anything I mean somebody could have a gun to my head I would still not call the police because then just to me it escalates the situation I really can't justify it I'm not him Sean I mean this is always a great conversation with you but I have we have two questions I hope we can get these questions answered I love them so from this point forward right now I'm

[28:00] quoting you on your website from this point forward I know my mission but change can you expound on that what would you like to do what would you like to see happen you know what my wife said something when I was first arrested she said if they thought that this would silence you they don't know you at all and she was right you know I I like to think that I'm well-known enough or notorious enough in this country that I have a soapbox I've got a daily radio

[28:30] show in Washington DC on 105.5 FM I have a weekly column in reader supported news I'm on the on the news shows all the time CNN Fox MSNBC people listen to what I have to say and I have a lot to say on issues like prison reform and sentencing reform and and respect for the Constitution of the United States and so I'm going to keep talking until they're sick and tired of hearing it and they either do something or they

[29:01] stop inviting me onto these shows all right water that they they keep but sorry I hope that they keep inviting you on the shows that they keep it affects effectuates a change I hope so I hope so so far so good knock on wood Sarah is there anything else you'd like to ask John I mean we're pretty close this the only thing I have is you know John what would you like to

[29:34] see change or happen with the legal system and what will you say to other people who've never experienced that system - the way you haven't warned them about it I think I'd like to say two things first what we need and second what I would say what we need is to do away with mandatory minimum sentencing when one out of every four black men in this country one out of every four imagine that is either on parole on probation or incarcerated in either jail or prison we have a problem well when

[30:05] one out of every two black men has spent time in jail or prison that's a problem when one out of every nine adults I mean walk down the street how many people do you see on the street one out of every nine adults has a felony conviction you have a problem we need to do something about charge stacking about overcharging about venue shopping we need to do something about about prosecutorial

[30:35] discretion which really is just ganging up on somebody whose politics you don't like in many cases the problem is in the Justice Department something has to be done there the advice that I would give and I cannot be any more crystal clear than what I'm going to say right now do not ever under any circumstances talk to a cop or talk to the FBI and I mean especially the FBI because they will lie

[31:06] they will cheat they will twist your words they will take them out of context and they'll use them against you and they'll charge you with the felony of making a false statement you cannot trust the FBI I've told ed Snowden Asst I've told Julian Assange and I'm telling every American who is watching this today don't talk to the FBI well very strong words and advice thank you John

[31:37] thanks for having me it's always a pleasure to see both of you yeah thanks John we wish you the best this year keep up the good work keep doing what you're doing yeah we can't have you on again and hear about what the what the latest update is fantastic and in the meantime I hope to see you at the libertarian convention that would be way before law to a job yeah all right Hey yeah
