“I’m going to play that card being pretty, white, and cute…and cry.”
(Augusta, GA) Alleged NSA leaker Reality Winner has been denied bail by a U.S District Court. Winner has been charged with leaking classified government documents to media outlet The Intercept; she has entered a plea of not guilty.
On Wednesday it was revealed that Ms. Winner is being held at the Lincoln County Jail in Lincolnton, Georgia. According to Sheriff Bruce Beggs, she had access to a phone to call her family. What she has been doing since her arrest was partially revealed during her hearing today.
According to prosecutor Jennifer Solari, Winner planned how to defend herself in phone calls with her sister. Solari stated that Winner told her sister “I’m going to play that card being pretty, white, and cute, braid my hair and cry and all.” The last time that Winner had been in court, for a traffic ticket in 2016, she claimed she was also Arab. When this information first came to light, concern was that Winner may not have had a grasp on reality itself; however, this information displays that she is seeking a way to manipulate the system.
Winner’s mother has been advocating for her to media outlets since she was arrested, saying she was concerned for her daughter’s safety and that she was innocent of all of these charges. However, the prosecutor also revealed that in a phone call from jail that Reality asked her mother to “play up this angle.” Despite this, Billie Winner-Davis told journalists after court that the prosecution has everything “so perfectly tied together” and that the government has “the perfect case” but none of it “matches.”
Rather than being a criminal mastermind, the prosecution also painted a picture of an amazingly incompetent woman bent on doing damage against the United States of America. As far back as November 9, 2016, Winner was using her work computer to search Google for questions like “Do top secret computers know when a thumb drive is inserted?”
Given Winner’s outspoken views against President Trump, it is most likely not coincidental that she began plotting her betrayal of America the day after he won the election. In notebooks seized when law enforcement executed a search warrant on her home, Winner had made statements about wanting to “Burn the White House down.” She has also previously reached out to Iranian government officials to express her support of the Islamic Republic instead of the United States.
In addition to the notebooks, agents also seized four phones, two computers, a tablet, and a handbook on Iran. It was noted that Winner was also in possession of an AR-15 and a shotgun. Prosecutors stated at least one of the computers had Tor installed on it, which makes one wonder why she reached out to The Intercept with her personal Gmail on an NSA work computer.
Winner reportedly admitted to all of the crimes when talking to agents; she faces ten years under the Espionage Act. However, comments were also recorded from prison where Winner told her mother she was responsible for “documents,” not a single document as she is currently charged with. Investigators are still seeking to identify the size and scope of her leak. There is also reportedly a thumb drive that has yet to be located; prosecutors say the thumb drive was from her time in the Air Force and had been utilized to download classified information.
