Trump Says He’ll Consider Pardoning Edward Snowden: ‘I’m Going to Take A Very Good Look at That’
On Saturday, President Donald Trump expressed a willingness to consider granting a pardon to Edward Snowden, the whistleblower who leaked thousands of highly classified documents he obtained from the National Security Agency while he was an employee and subcontractor for the Central Intelligence Agency.
Trump’s remarks came during the Q&A portion of a presser he called to talk about the state of the economy and the response to the coronavirus pandemic.
Snowden has been living in Russia for the past several years and has refused to return to the United States to face trial for the criminal charges against him. Opinions regarding Snowden’s actions vary widely, with people on both sides of the partisan political divide viewing him as a patriot or traitor.
“Do you want to give Edward Snowden a pardon and bring him back here?” a reporter asked.
“I’m going to look at it,” Trump replied. “I am not that aware of the Snowden situation, but I’m going to start looking at it. There are many, many people — it seems to be a split decision — there are many people think he should be somehow treated differently and other people think he did very bad things, and I’m going to take a very good look at it, OK?”
“I have seen people that are very conservative and very liberal and they agree on the same issue,” Trump continued. “I’m going to take a look at that very strongly, Edward Snowden.”
Watch the video above, via Fox News.
