An attorney who represents government whistleblowers on Thursday mocked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem for making a rookie mistake while condemning leakers in her department.
Writing in Salon, attorney Jesselyn Radack noted that Noem recently said during a Sunday news television appearance that individuals within DHS "were leaking our enforcement operations that we had planned and were going to conduct in several cities.”
"I’ve represented a number of alleged 'leakers' and this struck me as odd for many reasons," wrote Radack, whose most famous client is NSA leaker Edward Snowden. "As an initial matter, when government, law enforcement, and/or military operations are the subject of an unauthorized disclosure, the government rarely confirms the leak’s authenticity right out of the gate. The first official response is usually that the government can 'neither confirm nor deny' that a leak even occurred."
What's more, Radack added, Noem even went the extra step of verifying the veracity of the leak, which has traditionally been a big no-no among government officials.
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"By verifying and describing the leak, Noem essentially rebroadcasted it — this time with a louder megaphone and the imprimatur of the United States," Radack explained.
The attorney then speculated that there were two possible explanations for Noem's disclosure: The first is that she was being "sloppy," while the second is that she was trying to intimidate other employees in the department from leaking in the future.
"None of this is sound investigatory practice, nor a sign of a healthy, trusting, well-functioning government agency — especially one in charge of our homeland security," Radack observed.