In this special episode of CovertAction Bulletin, we spend the entire hour with former CIA analyst and field agent John Kiriakou. Kiriakou became a whistleblower when he exposed the CIA’s official torture program—and then became the only person jailed for it.
We discuss how the ongoing campaign against Julian Assange should inform us about how to view and support the work of other whistleblowers. While Assange remains in prison and under threat of extradition and trial in the U.S., the threat to journalists, publishers and activists continues to grow.
Bradley Birkenfeld, who exposed one of the largest tax scams in U.S. history, should also be pardoned
On February 20, 2025, Donald Trump created the new position of the “Pardon Czar” to recommend “executive clemency” candidates, naming Alice Marie Johnson to that role.
Johnson had been sentenced to life imprisonment without...
Ulfkotte’s political awakening about the corruption of the media industry came when he was sent to cover the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s and was instructed to present Iraq as the good guys
A former editor for the German main daily newspaper, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), Dr. Udo Ulfkotte became...
Whistleblowers past and present, who fought against injustices and exposed the truth about government malpractice, were honored at an event at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., on July 30 featuring a tribute to Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg.
The event was part of the 11th Annual...
I have made more than several trips to Iceland over the past several months. I genuinely love the place. The population is small, highly educated, friendly, and welcoming to outsiders. I have been consistently surprised at the number of Syrian, Kurdish and Ukrainian refugees that I have met, all...
Laura Martinez was living an idyllic life in an upscale San Antonio suburb with her common-law husband Charlie Thrash, 78, when, on March 6, 2019, Charlie was taken by police from their home and placed in an assisted living facility.
Charlie was declared to be incapacitated and placed under guardianship...
Nearly 13 years after WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange released the video Collateral Murder exposing the brutal and intentional killing of Iraqi civilians and two Reuters journalists, over 150 people packed the same room in the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. for the Belmarsh Tribunal. January 20th’s sitting was...
In a new CovertAction webinar famed Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg slams the author of new book alleging that Agee was a traitor when, ironically, everything in the book virtually screams out the opposite.
Dr. Whitney Louis is a prison psychologist with more than 15 years of experience working in prisons and jails across the U.S. In 2018 she decided to take up a new position in her home state at Dr. Eddie Warrior Correctional Center (EWCC), a minimum-security facility located in Taft,...
Former CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou says that “the deck has been stacked against whistleblowers” because of their prosecution under the 1917 Espionage Act, which defines them as national traitors...
