Our nation’s list of prominent traitors continues to grow at an extremely damaging pace.
Not long ago OpsLens published an article titled, “A Tale of Three Traitors: Manning, Snowden, and Bergdahl.” In that article, the glaring message was the repeated lack of examination and proper vetting of those who we as a nation put in positions of extreme trust. The number of contractors, federal workers, and military personnel who hold positions of trust, typically those verified by the issuing of security clearances, is astounding.
Every branch of the military, every branch of federal law enforcement, and of course the various agencies entrusted with the task of operating and conducting intelligence missions have personnel with different levels of clearance and access to sensitive and classified information. Politicians and those who work in the government often also have some level of access to classified information.
During my career in the military and later as a security contractor in Afghanistan and Iraq, I was issued a security clearance. That clearance and the access authorized by it was necessary for the mission in which I was involved. Like me, the majority of the staff and contributors here at OpsLens have all been in that same situation: investigated, extensively examined, and vetted before access was granted. It must also be understood that no clearance is permanent. Background updates, reexaminations, and constant monitoring is the norm.
I think it is fair to say that with our collective background and understanding of the importance of clearances and the inherent trust granted to us, the leaking of classified information is something that is abhorrent and goes against the very fiber of what we do, what we did, and what we believe.
The three aforementioned traitors have been joined by another; now there are four. Reality Leigh Winner, a young female born in December 1991, became the newest member of this infamous group and now faces ten years in federal prison. Winner was a federal contractor with a Top Secret security clearance. She worked for Pluribus International Corporation and had been assigned to a U.S. government agency facility in Augusta, Georgia, since February 13, 2017. Winner served in the Air Force from December 2010 to 2016. Her rank was Senior Airman, and her last duty title was cryptologic language analyst. She speaks Pashto, Dari, and Farsi. According to the Air Force, she served in Columbia, Maryland.
The following is taken directly from the Affidavit filed by the FBI requesting the arrest warrant for Reality Winner:
WINNER was a contractor with Pluribus International Corporation assigned to a U.S. Government Agency facility in Georgia. She has been employed at the facility since on or about February 13, 2017, and has held a Top Secret clearance during that time. As set forth in further detail below, on or about May 9, 2017, WINNER printed and improperly removed classified intelligence reporting, which contained classified national defense information and was dated on or about May 5, 2017 (the “intelligence reporting”) from an Intelligence Community Agency (the “U.S. Government Agency”) and unlawfully retained it. Approximately a few days later, WINNER then unlawfully transmitted the intelligence reporting to an online news outlet (the “News Outlet”).
On June 3, 2017, your affiant (the FBI agent requesting the warrant) spoke to WINNER at her home in Augusta, Georgia. During that conversation, WINNER admitted intentionally identifying and printing the classified intelligence reporting at issue despite not having a “need to know,” and with knowledge that the intelligence reporting was classified. WINNER further admitted removing the classified intelligence reporting from her office space, retaining it, and mailing it from Augusta, Georgia, to the News Outlet, which she knew was not authorized to receive or possess the documents. WINNER further acknowledged that she was aware of the contents of the intelligence reporting and that she knew the contents of the reporting could be used to the injury of the United States and to the advantage of a foreign nation.
It should have been easily seen that Reality Winner, like Snowden, Manning, and Bergdahl, was a threat to the security of the U.S. She should not have been in the position in which she was placed nor issued the clearance she was allowed. A simple examination of her actions online, her Twitter activity, and her stances taken concerning the U.S. should have been more than enough to set off alarms and revoke her access.
She was very open in her views against President Trump. She made comments and tweeted many others statements that would lead anyone to believe that she was not someone to be working with Top Secret information. She pledged allegiance to Iran and even communicated directly on Twitter with the Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif. She self-identified as a “Caucasian, Asian Indian, Arab,” although she does not have that ethnic background.
How the various vetting officials could have missed the clear problems with Winner is exactly the type of lack of oversight that allowed Snowden and Manning to damage our nation through their traitorous acts. It does not take someone whose entire job is to investigate backgrounds to see that this was a trainwreck waiting to happen.
There is also a commonality in these three. All three were young, naive, lacked a college education, and had little experience in the real world. It may be time to relook at who we trust with our vital and secret information. It takes years to create a clear and complete picture into the psychology of a person. Investigators who are looking at only three to five years of adulthood to make determinations as to who can and cannot be vetted correctly are at an extreme disadvantage. That amount of background does not give them enough information to work with. In these cases, the problems were open, glaring, and easy to determine. Someone dropped the ball. They, or the system that allows these oversights to occur, need to be reexamined.
