DETROIT – Today, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (MI-12) introduced the Daniel Ellsberg Press Freedom and Whistleblower Protection Act to reform the Espionage Act to prevent its use and abuse against whistleblowers, journalists, and the American public for exposing government corruption and wrongdoing. Such Espionage Act prosecutions have been used to silence dissent and undermine government transparency and are a clear violation of the First Amendment and the fundamental right to due process.
This legislation is named in honor of the late Daniel Ellsberg, the celebrated whistleblower who bravely exposed government lies about the Vietnam War with the Pentagon Papers and faced charges under the Espionage Act. Prior to his passing in 2023, Ellsberg provided public support for these proposed legislative reforms when Congresswoman Tlaib introduced them as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act.
“Alerting the public to government wrongdoing is not a crime,” said Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib. “The Espionage Act has been abused by administrations of both parties to target whistleblowers and journalists for sharing critically important information with the public. With whistleblowers, journalists, and civil liberties under significant attack and government decision-making shrouded in increasing secrecy, reining in the abuses of the Espionage Act could not be more urgent.”
Since its adoption in 1917, the Espionage Act has been used to persecute and criminalize political dissent, free speech, and the actions of whistleblowers working with the media to alert the American people about government lies about the Vietnam War, mass surveillance, torture, drone assassinations, and war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Under recent U.S. administrations, use of the Espionage Act to prosecute media sources and whistleblowers acting in the public interest has expanded dramatically, with high-profile charges against figures such as Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, Daniel Hale, and Julian Assange producing a chilling effect for journalists and potential whistleblowers. In January, the FBI raided the home of a Washington Post reporter in connection to an Espionage Act prosecution of a government whistleblower.
The Daniel Ellsberg Press Freedom and Whistleblower Protection Act would reform the Espionage Act to protect whistleblowers and prevent the law’s use against journalists, publishers, and members of the general public. It accomplishes this by:
“For almost 110 years, the Espionage Act has cast a shadow over our First Amendment,” said Chip Gibbons, Policy Director at Defending Rights & Dissent. “From its inception, the law has been used to stifle public debate and has become the go to weapon against whistleblowers and now journalists. Public servants who witness egregious crimes like torture, mass surveillance of Americans, or the killing of civilians, and seek to alert the American people about them are whistleblowers. Yet, using the Espionage Act the government prosecutes them as though they were spies. And with the government going further, and prosecuting a journalist under the Espionage Act, the threat not just to press freedom, but to our very democracy, posed by this antiquated law is growing. Rep. Tlaib’s bill is desperately needed as it is well past time to bring the Espionage Act in line with the First Amendment.”
“For too long, presidential administrations of both parties have weaponized the outdated Espionage Act to criminalize the whistleblowers and journalists who expose government wrongdoing,” said Lauren Harper, the Daniel Ellsberg Chair on Government Secrecy at Freedom of the Press Foundation. “Representative Tlaib’s bill finally brings this law in line with essential First Amendment protections, ensuring it can no longer be used as a cudgel against the free press. This legislation rightly prioritizes the public’s right to know over baseless, self-serving secrecy claims.”
“For too long the Espionage Act has been used to persecute and silence whistleblowers, journalists and publishers,” said Jenna Leventoff, Senior Policy Counsel, American Civil Liberties Union. “But journalism is not a crime – it is a First Amendment protected activity that protects our democracy by allowing the public to hold our nation’s leaders to account. Amending the Espionage Act to protect reporters will mean that the government could no longer abuse this law to silence those sharing information that is beneficial to the public. We thank Rep. Tlaib for working to protect the First Amendment.”
This legislation is cosponsored by Representatives Jesús “Chuy” García (IL-04), Summer Lee (PA-12), Eleanor Holmes Norton (DC), Ilhan Omar (MN-05), Delia Ramirez (IL-03), and Shri Thanedar (MI-13).
This legislation is endorsed by American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Amnesty International USA, Center for Constitutional Rights, Coalition for Women in Journalism, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Defending Rights & Dissent, Demand Progress, Ellsberg Initiative for Peace and Democracy, Fight for the Future, Freedom of the Press Foundation, Government Information Watch, Just Foreign Policy, Project on Government Oversight (POGO), Radio Television Digital News Association, Reporters Without Borders, Restore the Fourth, RootsAction, Society of Environmental Journalists, Society of Professional Journalists, Whistleblower & Source Protection Program (WHISPeR) at ExposeFacts, and X-Lab.
The full text of the legislation can be found here.
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