Edward Snowden says he repeatedly raised constitutional concerns about National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance internally, but an NSA search turned up a single e-mail in which Snowden gently asks for “clarification” on a technical legal question about training materials, agency officials said.
Asked by NBC News’ Brian Williams in an interview this week whether he first raised his qualms with his bosses, he said: “I reported that there were real problems with the way the NSA was interpreting its legal authorities.”
On Thursday, the NSA released the e-mail it said Snowden appeared to be referring to, which the agency says is the only communication from Snowden that it could find expressing any concerns from him.
It was dated April 8 last year, three months after Snowden first reached out to journalists anonymously.
Former NSA director General Keith Alexander said that the agency could find no one to whom Snowden voiced concerns verbally either.
In the e-mail to the NSA’s general counsel’s office, Snowden questions an NSA document showing the hierarchy of governing authorities, which appeared to put executive orders on par with US federal statutes.
“I’m not entirely certain, but this does not seem correct, as it seems to imply executive orders have the same precedence as law,” Snowden said in the e-mail. “Could you please clarify?”
An unidentified NSA lawyer began his reply: “Hello, Ed,” and told Snowden he was correct: Executive orders cannot override US federal law.
In an e-mail to the Washington Post, Snowden called the official release of the e-mail “incomplete,” the newspaper reported late on Thursday.
“If the White House is interested in the whole truth, rather than the NSA’s clearly tailored and incomplete leak today for a political advantage, it will require the NSA to ask my former colleagues, management and the senior leadership team about whether I, at any time, raised concerns about the NSA’s improper and at times unconstitutional surveillance activities,” Snowden wrote in response to questions from the Post.
“It will not take long to receive an answer,” he added.
“There were and there are numerous avenues that Mr Snowden could have used to raise other concerns or whistle-blower allegations,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Thursday.
“The appropriate authorities have searched for additional indications of outreach from Mr Snowden in those areas and to date have not found any engagements related to his claims,” Carney added.
American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Ben Wizner, Snowden’s legal adviser, called the e-mail issue “a red herring” and insisted Snowden “raised many complaints over many channels.”
“The problem was not some unknown and isolated instance of misconduct,” he said.
“The problem was that an entire system of mass surveillance had been deployed — and deemed legal — without the knowledge or con
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