James Clapper: Difference between revisions - Wikipedia

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On March 12, 2013, during a [[United States Senate]] [[United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence|Select Committee on Intelligence]] hearing, Senator [[Ron Wyden]] quoted the keynote speech at the 2012 [[DEF CON]] by the director of the NSA, [[Keith B. Alexander]]. Alexander had stated that "Our job is foreign intelligence" and that "Those who would want to weave the story that we have millions or hundreds of millions of dossiers on people, is absolutely false…From my perspective, this is absolute nonsense." Senator Wyden then asked Clapper, "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" He responded, "No, sir." Wyden asked "It does not?" and Clapper said "Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertently, perhaps, collect, but not wittingly."<ref name=Greenbergdenied>Greenberg, Andy. "[http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/06/06/watch-top-u-s-intelligence-officials-repeatedly-deny-nsa-spying-on-americans-over-the-last-year-videos/ Watch Top U.S. Intelligence Officials Repeatedly Deny NSA Spying On Americans Over The Last Year (Videos)]." ''[[Forbes]]''. June 6, 2013. Retrieved on June 11, 2013. "Eight months later, Senator Ron Wyden quoted[...]"</ref>

When [[Edward Snowden]] was asked during his January 26, 2014 TV interview in Moscow what the decisive moment was or why he blew the whistle, he replied: "Sort of the breaking point was seeing the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, directly lie under oath to Congress. … Seeing that really meant for me there was no going back." <ref name="NDR">{{cite web|title= Snowden Interview Transcript |url= http://www.ndr.de/ratgeber/netzwelt/snowden277_page-2.html |publisher=[[Norddeutscher Rundfunk|NDR]]|accessdate=27 January 2014}}</ref> NPR reported that Snowden's allusion was to Clapper's March 12, 2013, testimony,<ref>{{cite web|last=Chappell |first=Bill |title=Edward Snowden Nominated For Nobel Peace Prize |url=http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/01/29/268421741/edward-snowden-is-nominated-for-the-nobel-peace-prize |work=NPR|accessdate=2 May 2014}}</ref> three months after Snowden first sought to share thousands of NSA documents with journalist [[Glenn Greenwald]].<ref name="Maass">[[Peter Maass]] (August 18, 2013), [http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/18/magazine/laura-poitras-snowden.html How Laura Poitras Helped Snowden Spill His Secrets] ''[[The New York Times]]</ref> "Seeing that," Snowden added, "really meant for me there was no going back."<ref name="NDR"/>

===Admission and responses===