"Whistleblowers die broke"
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"Whistleblowers die broke" is a remark John Kiriakou attributes to Daniel Ellsberg and returns to when describing the practical aftermath of his own case.

The remark

Kiriakou has said that Daniel Ellsberg once told him that the one thing all whistleblowers have in common is that they die broke, that they are never able to recover. 

Kiriakou's own position

He applies it to himself directly. Asked about the gap between how he is seen and how he lives, Kiriakou answered that he is just a normal guy, that there is nothing special about him in any way, and that he is subject to the same pressures as everyone else, perhaps more, because his conviction cost him his federal pension, so that he is going to have to work until the day he dies. He presents this as simply a reality. 

The wider point

Kiriakou has made the same observation about the position of a whistleblower relative to the government's resources, citing a federal conviction rate of 98.2 per cent and attributing it to the impossibility of outlasting an opponent with unlimited means. He has also described his legal costs, which by his account ran past a million dollars and ended in bankruptcy. 

See also

- Daniel Ellsberg
- Bankruptcy And The Dropped Charges
- Whistleblowers and suicide
- John Kiriakou
