Today, Lonnie Snowden, father of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, spoke to NBC to make demands of the U.S. government that will facilitate his son’s return home.
Lonnie Snowden is confident that if the United States promises …
1. Not to immediately incarcerate his son
2. Does not to put him under a gag order, and
3. Allows him to pick the location of his trial,
it will convince his son to come to back to the United States to face trial.
However, Edward Snowden reportedly has not spoken to his son since April 2013. How can he possibly know what it would take to get his son to come home and face the music?
This an especially poignant question when considering Edward Snowden left Hong Kong last week. Snowden had previously explained that his choice of Hong Kong, a province with an extradition treaty with the United States, was purposeful. “I am not here to hide from justice,” he told the South China Morning Post. “I have had many opportunities to flee HK, but I would rather stay and fight the United States government in the courts, because I have faith in Hong Kong’s rule of law.” But now, Snowden is being harbored in a Russian airport and may be seeking asylum in Ecuador, two countries that would refuse any extradition requests the United States sends.
On the lamb from the law: Could Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and his team be manipulating Snowden into seeking asylum?
Lonnie Snowden had an explanation to explain his son’s shift in character: manipulation.
“I am concerned about those who surround him … I think Wikileaks, if you’ve looked at past history, their focus isn’t the constitution of the United States it’s simply to release as much information as possible so that alone is a concern for me,” he told NBC this morning.
The interview came in the wake of a letter sent from Bruce Fein, a Washington-based lawyer working for Lonnie Snowden, to Attorney General Eric Holder making the same demands for his son mentioned in the NBC interview.
Will anyone take Lonnie Snowden seriously? Would these demands, if met, actually convince the runaway whistleblower to come home? These questions raise enormous doubt, but we will have to wait and see.
