Via a reader tip comes news that Chelsea Manning is going to run for the US Senate in Maryland:
Chelsea Manning
Chelsea Manning, the former Army intelligence analyst convicted of leaking classified documents to WikiLeaks, confirmed Sunday that she’s running in Maryland for a Senate seat.
“Yup, we’re running for Senate,” Manning tweeted three days after she filed her statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission.
The tweet also included a campaign video indicating her intention to run in the 2018 Maryland Democratic primary and was followed by a tweet seeking donations to her campaign.
She is running for the seat held by two-term Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin. [Fox News]
I have a hard time believing the Democrats would allow a traitor and convicted felon like Manning to get elected to the Senate. Manning is basically a Cindy Sheehan like figure who thinks she is more important than what she really is. When Sheehan ran for Congress she was crushed by the Democrats, I expect the same thing will happen to Manning considering she has already used up her political usefulness.
Between Hillary Clinton and now Chelsea Manning and General Cartwright it just shows that there is different strokes for different folks when it comes to mishandling classified information:
Chelsea Manning
President Barack Obama on Tuesday overruled his secretary of defense to commute the sentence of former Army soldier Chelsea Manning, who was convicted of stealing and disseminating 750,000 pages of documents and videos to WikiLeaks.
The decision — which a senior defense official told CNN was made over the objections of Secretary of Defense Ash Carter — immediately touched off a controversy in the closing days of the Obama administration. A former intelligence official described being “shocked” to learn of Obama’s decision, adding that the “entire intelligence community is deflated by this inexplicable use of executive power.” The official said the move was “deeply hypocritical given Obama’s denunciation of WikiLeaks’ role in the hacking of the (Democratic National Committee).” [CNN]
Here is a thought question? If Manning wasn’t transgender would she have gotten the commuting of her sentence? It doesn’t matter now and Manning is undoubtedly going to be hero of the anti-war left when she is released in May.
With General Cartwright’s pardon what I found most interesting was the details of how he was caught by the FBI as a leaker in the first place:
General James Cartwright
The Stuxnet campaign appears to have been successful, and its disclosure, originally in a front-page New York Times story and a book by Sanger, helped burnish Obama’s national security credentials leading up to his 2012 reelection campaign. But FBI agents, after obtaining his email traffic, soon identified Cartwright — who had by then retired but continued to serve on the Defense Policy Board — as a key suspect. When he was interviewed in November 2012, Cartwright initially denied that he ever discussed classified information with Klaidman and Sanger. Then, FBI agents showed him his email correspondence with Klaidman. At that point, Cartwright “took off his glasses, started rubbing his eyes and told interviewing agents, ‘You got me’,” according to a court filing by prosecutors last week.
The agents then showed Cartwright an email exchange he had with Sanger. After reading through the email, “Cartwright was shaking, losing color in his face and clearing his throat. Cartwright attempted to explain the email; however, his speech became slurred and he subsequently slumped over in his chair and lost consciousness,” according to the court filing.
Cartwright was immediately rushed to the hospital. After his release a few days later, he agreed to another interview with the FBI and confessed that he had indeed discussed classified information with the journalists. He formally pleaded guilty last September and was due to be sentenced next week. [Yahoo News]
It just amazes me that someone of General Cartwright’s stature is leaking highly classified information to a reporter via email. He has to know that intelligence agencies would be targeting such emails for collection purposes.
What Manning did was not as bad as Snowden, but still Manning’s sentencing has sent a strong message to all US troops that leaking classified information to the media has strong repercussions:
Chelsea Manning
Chelsea Manning, the former U.S. Army soldier imprisoned for passing government documents to WikiLeaks, is on President Obama’s short list for possible commutation, according to NBC News.
NBC’s report cited a source in the Justice Department.
A decision could come soon for Manning, who tried to commit suicide and went on a hunger strike last year to demand better treatment in prison.
Manning, 28, is serving a 35-year sentence in the military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. She pleaded guilty in 2013 to 10 charges related to theft and espionage.
Manning stole over 750,000 pages of classified and unclassified military documents, including videos of airstrikes, war logs and diplomatic cables. She then passed them to WikiLeaks.
Manning, previously known has Bradley, revealed herself as transgender in 2013. [Stars & Stripes]
