Eight years ago I blew the whistle on the CIA’s torture program. I knew there’d be trouble, but I never could’ve predicted the years-long ordeal that followed.
My revelations led to a four-year-long FBI investigation and five felony charges — against me, not the torturers. Facing a lifetime in prison, I pled guilty to a lesser charge of confirming the name of a former CIA colleague to a reporter who never published it.
That may sound familiar to you. It’s exactly what former CIA director David Petraeus did when he exposed the names of multiple undercover officers to his girlfriend. Petraeus took a plea to a misdemeanor. I didn’t have four stars on my shoulder, and I wasn’t a friend of the president’s, so I’d gotten stuck with a felony.
At sentencing, my judge gave me 30 months in prison and three years of probation, and she took away my federal pension. I left for prison believing that was the totality of my punishment. I was wrong.
One of the first things that happened upon my conviction was that the company with which I had my homeowner’s and auto insurance canceled my policies. They don’t do business with felons, they said. That same week, my credit card company canceled my card and demanded the immediate payment of the balance.
Then, shortly before my departure for prison, the agency that my wife and I used to hire child care providers also jumped on the bandwagon. They dropped us as clients and left us without anybody to help her care for our three young children while I was away.
When I finally came home from prison six months ago, I thought probation was all I had left to deal with. Yet even now, I’m still putting up with petty government harassment, even if the private sector has backed off.
I recently traveled to Greece to help the government there craft whistleblower and anti-corruption legislation. As a Greek-American and a whistleblower, I wanted to help my ancestral homeland climb out of its current political and economic troubles and get back on track.
I had great success in Greece, securing support for the legislation from the government and all major political parties. I’ll return to Greece in a few months to begin drafting the new law.
I landed back in Northern Virginia excited about my success and prospects in Greece. Imagine my surprise, then, when an immigration officer at Dulles International Airport stopped me and asked to see my passport.
“Have you ever been convicted of a crime?” he asked. “You know I have,” I told him. “It’s on your computer.” He then handed me my passport, but only after writing a large letter “C” on my customs form.
I walked to the customs line, but was then redirected to the customs office. I waited in a very long line only to be told to have a seat.
“Have you ever been convicted of a crime?” they asked again. “Yes,” I replied. “What does that have to do with being let back into my own country?”
The customs officer then called my probation officer to ask if I’d been allowed to leave the country. She said I had, so the customs agent finally let me go. The whole ordeal took an hour. After 12 hours in transit, it felt like a whole day.
I guess I’ll have to tolerate this nonsense every time I travel internationally. It’s another unseen addition to my sentence.
Something tells me that General Petraeus doesn’t have to put up with these hassles.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy