Pardon Snowden? Nah, White House Says in Petition Response

1	Pardon Snowden?
2	In a long-awaited petition response, the administration taunts the whistleblower, saying he should 'come home.'
3	The White House responded to a petition demanding a pardon for exiled whistleblower Edward Snowden on Tuesday, 25 months after it crossed the 100,000-signature threshold needed to earn an official reply.
4	The answer, emailed to petition signers and posted on the White House's "We the People" petition site, is unlikely to satisfy Snowden fans.
5	"This is an issue that many Americans feel strongly about," the response says.
6	"Because his actions have had serious consequences for our national security, we took this matter to Lisa Monaco, the President's Advisor on Homeland Security and Counterterrorism."
7	A five-paragraph commentary attributed to Monaco praises President Barack Obama for "work[ing] with Congress to secure appropriate reforms that balance the protection of civil liberties with the ability of national security professionals to secure information vital to keep Americans safe."
8	The reforms - which Obama signed into law with the USA Freedom Act last month - were forced by widespread outrage about surveillance practices disclosed by Snowden, including among members of Congress, many of whom felt misled about how the administration was using the 2001 Patriot Act.
9	A federal district court judge found the mass collection of phone records Snowden exposed likely was unconstitutional, and a federal appeals court panel later found the collection illegal.
10	Previously, courts refused to grant standing to people challenging suspected bulk collection.
11	Advocates hope the Supreme Court will use the cases to enhance privacy rights over electronic data.
12	But in the petition response, Monaco chides Snowden for not "constructively addressing these issues."
13	"Mr. Snowden's dangerous decision to steal and disclose classified information had severe consequences for the security of our country and the people who work day in and day out to protect it," she writes.
14	Repeating a taunt often made by members of the Obama administration, she continues: "If he felt his actions were consistent with civil disobedience, then he should do what those who have taken issue with their own government do: Challenge it, speak out, engage in a constructive act of protest, and - importantly - accept the consequences of his actions. He should come home to the United States, and be judged by a jury of his peers - not hide behind the cover of an authoritarian regime. Right now, he's running away from the consequences of his actions."
15	Snowden's attorneys and fellow whistleblowers have supported his decision to flee the U.S., first to Hong Kong and then to Russia, where he was stranded en route to Latin America when the U.S. State Department canceled his passport and where he currently has asylum.
16	His defenders say any trial would be held largely in secrecy and point out that he cannot use whistleblowing as a defense to the two Espionage Act charges he faces alongside a third for alleged theft of government property.
17	He had no avenue to legally blow the whistle, they add.
18	"How does President Obama think Snowden should have 'constructively addressed these issues' when his administration has led the worst crackdown on national security and intelligence whistleblowers in U.S. history?" says Jesselyn Radack, an attorney for Snowden.
19	"The actual consequences of Snowden's revelations have been an informed global debate that even the president acknowledges 'we needed to have,' two federal court decisions finding that the phone dragnet program [was] 'unlawful' and 'likely unconstitutional,' and the first significant intelligence reform legislation in 30 years."
20	There wasn't a specific "yes" or "no" from the White House on giving Snowden a pardon, but the response made clear the administration's frustration with the man who deeply embarrassed Obama by exposing not only vast phone and Internet surveillance but also U.S. spying on the leaders of allied countries.