Episode 6: Thomas Drake and Jesselyn Radack
Our final 2020 episode, focusing on the kafksesque trial of Julian Assange, is one of the most important, informative and compelling programs of the year, if not of the past 4. We discuss everything from A(ssange) to Z(imbabwe). The combo of the dynamic Sam Adams Award recipients Thomas Drake and Jesselyn Radack is a tour de force. Together, the two are the whistleblower community's Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers or William Powell and Myrna Loy.
Jesselyn Radack heads the Whistleblower and Source Protection Program (WHISPeR) at ExposeFacts. As National Security & Human Rights Director of WHISPeR, her work focuses on the issues of secrecy, surveillance, torture and drones, where she has been at the forefront of challenging the government’s unprecedented war on whistleblowers, which has become a war journalists, hacktivists, and those who reveal information that the public has right to know but the government wants kept secret.
Among her clients are national security and intelligence community employees who have been investigated, charged, or prosecuted under the Espionage Act for allegedly mishandling classified information, including drone whistleblower Brandon Bryant, NSA whistleblowers Edward Snowden, Thomas Drake and CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou. She also represents clients bringing whistleblower retaliation complaints in federal court and other administrative bodies. Previously, she headed the National Security and Human Rights program at the Government Accountability Project, a whistleblower protection organization, served on the DC Bar Legal Ethics Committee and worked at the Justice Department for seven years, first as a trial attorney and later as a legal ethics advisor.
Thomas Drake is a former senior executive at the National Security Agency, where he blew the whistle on massive multi-billion dollar fraud, the widespread violations of the rights of citizens through secret mass surveillance programs after 9/11, and critical 9/11 intelligence failures. In 2010, he was charged under the draconian Espionage Act for his oath to support and defend the US Constitution. In 2011, the government’s case against him collapsed and he went free in a plea deal. He is featured in the “Silenced” documentary as well as the US PBS Frontline special “The United States of Secrets”.
In 2017, Drake received his PhD in public policy and administration. His dissertation “Eyewitness to History in Devolution of Democracy and Constitutional Rights Following 9/11” focused on the centrality of the post-9/11 security driven world and the price paid by those who speak truth about the abuse of power and the erosion of our rights and freedoms. He speaks widely on privacy and security issues and the critical need to protect our inalienable human rights. Mr. Drake has a varied career background that includes teaching, information technology, systems and software engineering, code analysis and military and intelligence experience. He is now dedicated to the defense of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.