In a massive outpouring of support for the
29-year-old systems administrator behind last week's
National Security Administration surveillance leak, hundreds of civil liberties advocates and concerned citizens are staging a
mass demonstration in New York City's Union Square Monday at noon to declare: "I stand with Edward Snowden."
The
demonstration follows revelations Sunday on the identity of the
whistleblower, a contracted employee for the private defense company
Booz Allen Hamilton, after he came forward in an
interview with
The Guardian newspaper.
Snowden was the source behind the outlet's multiple breaking news
stories on the NSA's massive surveillance mechanism.
Monday's solidarity protest is the first of many events planned in
cities across the country as a "groundswell of concern for Snowden's
welfare" has erupted in the wake of his confession, according to
demonstration organizers.
Snowden is currently seeking refuge in Hong Kong and is facing a
criminal investigation by the US Department of Justice, indicating that
he may soon be seeking political asylum.
Organizers of Monday's event hope to elevate the conversation Snowden
initiated regarding the preservation of 4th Amendment protections in
this era of new media.
“The greatest fear that I have regarding the outcome for America of
these disclosures is that nothing will change.” said Snowden in his
Guardian interview.
“People will see, in the media, all of these disclosures, they know the
lengths that the government is going to grant themselves, unilaterally,
to create greater control over American society, and global society,
but they wont be willing to take the risks necessarily to stand up and
fight to change things, to force their representatives to actually take a
stand in their interests.”
“Edward Snowden chose to willfully free dark side national security
information as a brave and courageous act of selfless civil
disobedience,”
said former
NSA executive director, Thomas Drake, who in 2010 was arrested under
the US Espionage Act for publicly challenging a similar data-vacuuming
project called Trailblaizer.
Ahead of the protest, many voiced their support for this "new hero" online.
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