Imprisoned WikiLeaks whistleblower Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning sent a letter to the Freedom of the Press Foundation, thanking us for our successful campaign to transcribe and bring transparency to her lengthy trial. “Without your efforts, my court-martial would not have been nearly as visible to the public, and many of …
Former IRS contractor Charles Littlejohn received the maximum sentence of five years’ imprisonment on Monday, after pleading guilty to leaking Donald Trump’s returns to The New York Times. Littlejohn also leaked a tranche of ultrawealthy Americans’ tax documents to ProPublica. It’s sadly ironic that Littlejohn is being harshly punished for exposing billionaire tax evasion while billionaire tax evaders themselves continue to be afforded leniency by the judiciary.
Plus: Attacks on legal services are attacks on the press
Today the Senate passed a version of the USA Freedom Act, a bill touted by its authors as surveillance reform that will end the NSA’s mass, suspicionless collection of Americans’ personal data. Given that parts of the Patriot Act expired on June 1st, and that the government is pretending …
Rainey Reitman succeeds NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden as FPF's board president.
Our board member John Cusack held an expansive Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) yesterday and took a variety of questions on freedom of the press, the Obama administration, acting, directing, and activism. Here are some of the highlights that touched on issues he is involved with at Freedom of the …
This week, Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) unveiled a new website that reflects our commitment to action-based advocacy for press freedom.
The Senate is dangerously close to passing a bill that would allow intelligence agencies to essentially “institute a spy draft” and order everyone from dentists to plumbers to surveil their patients and customers’ communications. The RISAA would also allow the government to order commercial landlords who rent space to media outlets, or contractors who service newsrooms, to help it spy on American journalists’ communications with foreign sources.
It’s nearly impossible to gauge the full impact of harassment of the press. How do you measure the stories that go untold because a journalist felt intimidated? How do you quantify the corruption that won’t be exposed because sources are afraid to talk? When the impact of threats is silence, …
This post is adapted from CJ Ciaramella's weekly Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) newsletter, which you can subscribe to here. Holder resigns: You probably heard the news that Attorney General Eric Holder announced his resignation yesterday. Holder will leave behind a historic legacy on many issues, but unfortunately …