Snowden Equates Himself to Dr. Martin Luther King
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“Martin Luther King brought forth this brand of civil disobedience . . . to create change that could not be ignored”
Edward Snowden on Thursday invoked Martin Luther King Jr.’s nonviolent civil disobedience to condemn the U.S. for how it treats whistleblowers, warning that others may not stand up for alleged wrongdoing if they fear punishment.
The former National Security Agency contractor, who in 2013 revealed a trove of classified secrets on the intelligence agency’s surveillance programs, defended his leaks as an act of “public service” while virtually addressing a crowd at the University of Chicago Institute of Politics.
“Martin Luther King brought forth this brand of civil disobedience . . . to create change that could not be ignored,” said Snowden, who appeared on a video screen from Russia, where he is living under temporary asylum. “If all of the weight is borne by a single individual, you can’t build a mass movement because the first one to step forward is put in jail forever.”
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