Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama's Washington

by Sharyl Attkisson

  “Insist on it,” one of the experts tells me. “Don’t take no for an answer. Don’t let them leave the house until they replace it and move it.”

  Add to the glitches a new one: our Internet has begun disconnecting anytime a landline is in use. My kid’s on her iPad, the phone rings, I answer it, and blop, she’s bumped offline. I’m doing business on my Apple desktop, I pick up the phone to make a call, and blop, my Internet connection drops. You don’t realize how often you use the phone and the Internet at the same time until you can’t. So in early February 2013, a Verizon technician visits our home and two supervisors show up, too. A three-fer. The tech sits upstairs and works on my Apple desktop beside the router. The male supervisor comes, takes a look around, and leaves. The female supervisor chats up me and my husband downstairs in the kitchen. We mull over the familiar disturbances and I direct them to replace the whole outdoor box and move it inside. They tell me it’s not necessary. I keep thinking of Patel saying, “Don’t take no for an answer.” So I tell the Verizon pair that I have a security expert who insists this step be taken. But they’re formidable. It’s not necessary, they say. They know their business. As adamant as I am about moving the box, they’re just as adamant about not doing so. If I’m concerned about security, they say, there are lots of private consultants whom I can hire to help me. The tech gives me a name and number for one of them. He says there are many folks in Northern Virginia who need those special types of services. When the Verizon pair departs, our Internet is working, but the other same old problems persist.

  I’ve been an Apple user since my first personal computer purchase circa 1989. My Macintosh, my Quadra, my Color Classic, my Performa, my iMac. As far as I know, I’ve never had viruses or major malfunctions with my Apples. I replace them not because they break but because they eventually run out of memory or I want the next generation. But now, my Apple iMac desktop begins a new behavior I’ve never before observed: it winds itself into a fever. The fan starts churning and the pitch gets higher and becomes so loud, it sounds as if it’s going to explode. We shut it down and restart it but it happens again. On the third day of this, my daughter runs from the computer down to the kitchen.

  “It’s burning up!” she tells me.

  I rush to the iMac to find it frozen, whining in its pre-explosion-sounding state, and it won’t let me shut it down. This time there’s a pungent smell of burning electronics. I reach underneath the desk and unplug it: that’s all she wrote. The iMac is deceased. R.I.P., faithful Apple, you were so young.

  My husband and I are weighing whether and how to file a criminal complaint over the intrusion. A crime has been committed. Someone has, in essence, illegally entered my property and violated the privacy of my entire family. They’ve stolen my property by rifling through my work and removing data. They’ve placed classified materials on my computer for motives that can’t be considered anything but nefarious. But when the culprit is believed to be connected to the government, to whom, exactly, does one go to complain? Can you really turn to the Justice Department’s FBI when the Justice Department might be part of the plot? I consult some trusted advisors and decide to file a complaint with the Department of Justice inspector general.

  Every federal agency has its own inspector general designed to serve as an independent watchdog. The way I figure it, the best-case scenario is that the IG is honest and conducts a real investigation. Worst-case scenario: nothing comes of it, but at least the inquiry puts operative insiders on official alert: your actions are known and being probed. The idea is to try to create an environment that makes their deception and cover-up that much more difficult. So on April 3, 2013, I file the complaint. It’s six weeks before the government snooping scandals would be revealed.

  In a way, I’m at the center of the ultimate story. As disturbing as it is, I also find it intriguing. A widening circle of sources and contacts is interested, too. Some of them want to help me. They clue me into the many possibilities that exist. There are a thousand ways to spy on a private citizen. When we meet, before they speak to me, they put away their smartphones and tell me to lose mine, too. They don’t want to talk in my house. I lose count of how many of them tell me that the government—or anyone with skill—can remotely turn on my smartphones and listen to me. Not just when I’m using the phone, but even when I think it’s powered down. As long as the battery’s in it, they can activate the microphone to hear what I’m doing and to whom I’m speaking. And when they’re doing this, the phone doesn’t appear to be on at all. Other sources tell me that sophisticated intruders have the capability to suck information out of my smartphones and computers, or for that matter put stuff in them, without even physically connecting to them. The devices simply have to be in proximity to the perpetrator’s smartphone or device. Just innocently put one on a table next to another and Floop! it’s compromised. How many times have I set my BlackBerry or iPhone near a colleague’s, a stranger’s, or a business associate’s? And pretty much all of my self-appointed advisors tell me to use burner phones, which I am. They suggest I should have an acquaintance who’s not closely connected to me purchase the device and buy the minutes. Switch it out a lot. One intelligence source advises me to remove the phone battery before I cross the threshold into my driveway. Don’t put the battery in or use the phone while in my house.

  Two acquaintances with knowledge of government surveillance and spy methods insist on sweeping my house and vehicle for bugs and signs of intrusions. They don’t know each other and each uses different methods. They’re not official, professional sweeps, just what can be done with devices like simple signal detectors and a FLIR thermal imaging device. They feel that the government has overstepped its bounds by spying on me, and helping me makes them feel like they’re doing something about it. I appreciate their consideration, but I don’t think they’ll find anything.

  “What’s the point?” I ask.

  “You never know, you might be surprised at what turns up. And it’s no trouble to look,” says one.

  Between the two of them, they check the walls, the telephones. Lamps, bookshelves. They climb into the attic, where the Verizon man once lurked. They disassemble my electric power strips, examine the alarm system, and sweep the inside and outside of my car. Nothing.

  The truth is, I’ve given up on the idea of privacy for the moment. Those who possess the skills to do what they’ve already done can pretty easily penetrate most any computer or device, most anytime, most anyplace. One source explains to me that Microsoft works on coding with the government so that anti-malware programs view the government’s spyware as something friendly that belongs in the Microsoft environment. I belong here, the intruder tells the virus scanner. Move along, nothing to see, you amateurs. I can switch out phones, put a Band-Aid over the camera in my computer, and run debugging programs all day long. For those who have the toys and technology, defeating my defenses is child’s play.

  On May 6, 2013, I make contact with an excellent source who has crucial information: the name of the person responsible for my computer intrusions. He provides me the name and I recognize it. I’m not surprised. It strikes me as desperate and cowardly that those responsible would resort to these tactics. That’s all I can say about that for now.

  The inspector general’s office checks in and gives me a bit of information. It’s the same thing Number One told me in January: there’s no PATRIOT Act order on me. The IG official also says the FBI denies having anything to do with my situation. Naturally, I’m dubious. I wonder who at the FBI was asked, what words they used in their denial, and was any of this put in writing. I suggest to the IG official that he might not be getting the whole story. He wants to know if my sources will speak with his office. I approach Number One.

  “Frankly, I’m not comfortable,” he tells me. “The IG works for the people who did this to you.”

  Inspectors general are supposed to be independent watchdogs of their agencies
, and the Justice Department IG has a good reputation. But there can be an element of political influence even in some of the best IG offices. Number One’s been around the block. He doesn’t trust the IG. He says I shouldn’t, either.

  It’s with great interest that I retrospectively view an interesting publication on WikiLeaks to which a contact directs my attention. On February 27, 2012, WikiLeaks began publishing five million emails purported to be from the Texas-headquartered “global intelligence” company Stratfor. One document of particular interest is dated September 2010 and is titled, “Obama Leak Investigations.”

  “Brennan is behind the witch hunts of investigative journalists learning information from inside the beltway sources,” it says. “There is a specific tasker from the [White House] to go after anyone printing materials negative to the Obama agenda (oh my). Even the FBI is shocked.”

  All of this tees up the global news that’s about to break revealing the Obama administration’s surveillance of reporters—and the general public.

  Obama Leak Investigations (internal use only—pls do not forward)

  Released on 2012-09-10 00:00 GMT

  Email-ID: 1210665

  Date: 2010-09-21 21:38:37

  From: burton@stratfor.com

  To: secure@stratfor.com

  Brennan is behind the witch hunts of investigative journalists learning

  information from inside the beltway sources.

  Note—There is specific tasker from the WH to go after anyone printing

  materials negative to the Obama agenda (oh my.) Even the FBI is

  shocked. The Wonder Boys must be in meltdown mode. . . .

  | OBAMA’S “WAR ON LEAKS”

  Four months after Number One first identified my computer intrusions, I’m watching the news. It’s May 13, 2013, and there’s a breaking story that sets off a pang of familiarity. I instinctively feel that it’s related to my own situation. It’s not so much that the details are the same—they’re not. But there’s something about the story line: a U.S. government entity secretly, audaciously, reaching into the private communications of news reporters.

  The news is that the Justice Department had seized the records of twenty phone lines used by employees of the news organization Associated Press. AP says the records are from personal home and cell phone numbers belonging to editors and reporters, office numbers of various AP bureaus, and AP phones used in the press quarters in the House of Representatives, where members of the media have office space. It’s unheard-of. Why did the government take this drastic measure? To try to catch and prosecute the government source who provided information for a 2012 AP story about a foiled underwear bomb plot. The Justice Department had issued the subpoenas to telephone companies but granted itself an exception to its own normal practice in deciding not to provide advance notice of its intentions to AP. Advance notice would have given AP the chance to challenge the move in court. Only now, months after the fact, is the Justice Department disclosing its controversial subpoenas to the news outlet’s managers. Incensed AP officials publicly attack the action as a “massive and unprecedented intrusion by the Department of Justice into the news-gathering activities of the Associated Press.”

  It’s perhaps the first time the Obama administration feels the sting of meaningful criticism from such a wide-ranging group of news media. They’re calling it Obama’s War on Leaks. On May 14, 2013, a coalition of more than fifty news organizations, including ABC, CNN, NPR, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press writes a strongly worded letter of objection to Holder. It reads in part:

  The nation’s news media were stunned to learn yesterday of the Department of Justice’s broad subpoena of telephone records belonging to The Associated Press. In the thirty years since the Department issued guidelines governing its subpoena practice as it relates to phone records from journalists, none of us can remember an instance where such an overreaching dragnet for newsgathering materials was deployed by the Department, particularly without notice to the affected reporters or an opportunity to seek judicial review. The scope of this action calls into question the very integrity of Department of Justice policies toward the press and its ability to balance, on its own, its police powers against the First Amendment rights of the news media and the public’s interest in reporting on all manner of government conduct, including matters touching on national security which lie at the heart of this case.

  The Justice Department responds to the growing privacy concerns by the media with a statement saying that it “takes seriously the First Amendment right to freedom of the press” and that Holder “understands the concerns that have been raised by the media and has initiated a reevaluation of existing Department policies and procedures.”

  How does this story fit into my circumstances? It’s a puzzle I’m trying to sort out but a lot of the pieces are missing.

  The AP story turns out to be the first in a rapid-fire succession of strange-but-true revelations about the government’s aggressive actions against news reporters. Less than a week later, on Sunday, May 19, 2013, comes word that the Obama administration has targeted another national news journalist: FOX News reporter James Rosen. Again, it’s supposedly part of a government leak investigation, this one into a State Department contractor who was later indicted. Attorney General Holder himself had approved the search warrant for Rosen’s Gmail account.

  It’s so Orwellian for the government to aim its investigative resources and prosecutorial tools at reporters who are doing their legal job. Is this all part of a broad, secretive program to target the Obama administration’s reportorial enemies? Am I on the list, too?

  It’s becoming clear that the administration is going after journalists and sources whom it views as the most harmful to its own self-interests. I think about when I was covering Fast and Furious and how the story reached all the way into the White House, prompting the president to declare executive privilege to keep from releasing documents to Congress. The government surely wanted to know what I knew and who was talking to me. Perhaps they felt they could justify monitoring me as another in this series of “leak investigations.” My Fast and Furious coverage bled over into the Benghazi period. The Obama administration was just as frantic over my reporting on that topic. Just as desperate to learn who was talking to me and what I was learning from them.

  With the discovery about the intrusions on AP and FOX reporters, a new public sentiment seems to be building: ordinary people are frightened by and outraged over the perceived assault on journalists and their sources.

  Just days into news of these controversies, I’m doing a round of radio interviews centered on my current Benghazi reporting. I’m on the air with Philadelphia radio talk show host Chris Stigall of WPHT 1210 AM when he segues to the subject of the government intrusions on reporters. I haven’t publicly discussed my own situation, which predates the public revelations about AP and FOX. But Stigall pops an unexpected question:

  “Do you know if your phone was tapped or your emails watched or seized while you were having conversations with unnamed sources on Benghazi, Sharyl?”

  Does he know? I hadn’t given any thought as to what I might say about my own computers. I answer the question on the spot without opening the door too wide.

  “I’m not ready to fully speak publicly about some things that have affected me because I’m trying to be methodical and careful about what I say. But there has been an issue in my house, and there’s been an issue with my computers that’s gone on for quite a long time that we’re looking into.”

  Stigall seems as surprised by my answer as I was by the question. For several minutes, he continues to press for more information and I give limited responses. I bring the interview to a close by saying, “There’s definitely been an intrusion into my computer system. I really can’t say more than that right now.”

  I wouldn�
�t have predicted the avalanche of interest that this brief radio interview would generate. Within minutes, word of my computer intrusions is being circulated on Internet blogs and is being tweeted about on Twitter. I know nothing of the chatter until I get a call from the CBS News press office. Inquiries are pouring in. It’s not long before friends and family email to tell me that bloggers are speculating that the White House is bugging me. Or that I’ve mistaken a common computer virus or automatic Windows updates for something nefarious. Or that I’m being hacked by an old boyfriend. It’s funny to hear some work so hard to discredit so much with so few facts.

  I haven’t named the Justice Department as a culprit or suspect. But considering the AP and FOX News incidents, it’s only natural that someone else in the media would ask the Justice Department to comment on the Attkisson case.

  In response, the agency issues this statement: “To our knowledge, the Justice Department has never ‘compromised’ Ms. Attkisson’s computers, or otherwise sought any information from or concerning any telephone, computer, or other media device she may own or use.”

  As someone who’s now an old hand at the way the administration parses words, my brain automatically shifts into read-between-the-lines mode.

  To our knowledge . . . says the Justice Department’s quasi-denial. Okay, that’s a qualifier. Leaves open a little room. And who is “our” referring to in “To our knowledge”? Does it mean the guy who wrote the statement and another who pressed the SEND button? The whole press office? The entire Justice Department? Did officials there really, in the blink of an eye, conduct an investigation and question 113,543 Justice Department employees? That’s impressive! I’m still waiting for answers to Freedom of Information Act requests I filed with them years ago, but they’re able to provide this semi-definitive statement within minutes of the question being posed.