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Curated research library of TV news clips regarding the NSA, its oversight and privacy issues, 2009-2014

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Primary curation & research: Robin Chin, Internet Archive TV News Researcher; using Internet Archive TV News service.

Speakers

James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
KNTV 06/16/2013
James Risen: One of the things that really I think concerns people is that you've created something that never existed in American history before, and that is a surveillance state. The infrastructure that, basically using software technology and data mining and eavesdropping, very sophisticated technology to create an infrastructure that a police state would have, and that's what really should concern Americans, because we haven't had a full national debate about the creation of a massive surveillance state and surveillance infrastructure that if we had some radical change in our politics could lead to a police state.
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James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
KQED 05/13/2014
Lichtblau: It was a bit shocking, not only that he was calling him, but also that he got Hayden on the line. Risen: I read him, like, two paragraphs of the draft of the story. Risen’s story: "Months after the September 11 attacks, President Bush secretly authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans and others..." Risen: And you could hear, like, a sharp intake of breath, like... (gasps) You know, it was almost like he was... He didn't want to say it, but he was like, "I can't believe you got that story." Hayden: I think this is a very bad thing. There is a reason we keep intelligence sources and methods secret. It's the same reason journalists try to keep their sources and methods secret. You know, you can't survive unless you keep them secret. Risen: I'd caught him off guard, and he had started to confirm it, and then realized what he was doing, and hung up.
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James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
KQED 05/13/2014
Narrator: It had been nearly one year since the New York Times had refused to publish the investigation into the NSA. During that year, "The Program" had grown dramatically. Terabytes-- huge amounts of information about Americans' telephone calls and emails-- had been clandestinely captured. Finally, reporter James Risen from the New York Times had had enough. He decided to strike out on his own. Risen: The story was dead now, twice dead, and I thought the only way to ever get this story out was to put it in a book. Narrator: Risen had a surprise for Eric Lichtblau. He invited him to drive over to his house to read a draft chapter of the book: the story the New York Times had refused to print.
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James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
KQED 05/13/2014
Lichtblau: The chapter was just called "The Program." And in it, he basically made known the existence of this program and the fact that the administration had gotten the paper to spike the story. Risen: I said, "I want to make sure it's okay with you." He said, "The only thing I ask is that you put my name in there, too." Narrator: It did not take long for the editors at the New York Times to get word of what Risen was planning. Taubman: I began to hear through the grapevine that he might include the NSA story in the book. So that led to a series of, you know, very awkward conversations with Jim. Risen: The editors were furious at me. They thought I was being insubordinate. Lichtblau: He had a gun to their head. They're really being forced to reconsider. The paper's gonna look pretty bad.
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Gwen Ifill
Co-Anchor and Managing Editor, PBS NewsHour
KQED 06/02/2014
Ifill: The government may be able to force a
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Myron Belkind
National Press Club President; Former AP Foreign Correspondent & Bureau Chief
CSPAN 08/14/2014
Belkind: Also unacceptable is the threat the prison being faced by James Risen of The New York Times because of his work as a professional journalist. This morning a petition signed by more than 100,000 persons was delivered to the Department of Justice declaring “We support James Risen because we support a free press.” Those petitioners significantly include 20 Pulitzer Prize winners who declared their support for Mr. Risen, who is refusing to name a source for information about a bungled CIA operation in Iran that appeared in his 2006 book
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Myron Belkind
National Press Club President; Former AP Foreign Correspondent & Bureau Chief
CSPAN 08/14/2014
Belkind: Also unacceptable is the threat the prison being faced by James Risen of The New York Times because of his work as a professional journalist. This morning a petition signed by more than 100,000 persons was delivered to the Department of Justice declaring “We support James Risen because we support a free press.” Those petitioners significantly include 20 Pulitzer Prize winners who declared their support for Mr. Risen, who is refusing to name a source for information about a bungled CIA operation in Iran that appeared in his 2006 book
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James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
CSPAN 08/14/2014
Risen: It's about some basic issues that affect all journalists and all Americans. My lawyers always tell me never to talk about my case but there are a couple of things I can say. And one is that the justice department and the Obama administration are the ones who turned this really into a fundamental fight over press freedom. In their appeal to the fourth circuit, they said this case, the central issue in this case was not some details or specifics or anything. The fundamental thing this case was about was there was no such thing as reporter’s privilege.
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James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
CSPAN 08/14/2014
Risen: I want to make sure the same protections I have had in my career are there for the future reporters in America. Because there is no way we could do our jobs if we don't have the ability to have aggressive investigative reporting in America and to have the ability to maintain confidential sources. There is just no way to conduct aggressive investigative reporting without a reporter’s privilege of some kind, without confidential sources. And I don't believe you can have democracy without aggressive investigative reporting and freedom of the press.
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James Risen
NYT National Security Journalist
CSPAN 08/14/2014
Risen: if you read the government's brief in the fourth circuit appeal, that's what they say -- there's no such thing as a reporters privilege. And so they turned this case into a showdown over the first amendment and over the freedom of the press in the United States. I’m happy to carry on that fight, but it wasn't me who really started it. this has been a long case -- I got subpoenaed in 2008 first, but what I can say now is with all of these people showing their support, I'm willing to keep fighting.
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