Former vice president Cheney weighs in on Snowden, disclosures

Former vice president

WASHINGTON Dick Cheney on Sunday called the contractor who disclosed information about top- secret U. S. surveillance programs a criminal and a traitor.

He said he also suspects Edward Snowden might be a spy. In an interview on Fox News Sun

day, Cheney accused the 29- year- old contract worker for the National Security Agency of damaging the nation’s intelligence capabilities by leaking documents about programs that track telephone and Internet communications. Snowden also said the U. S. has hacked into the systems of China and other countries.

“I think it’s one of the worst occasions in my memory of somebody with access to classified information doing enormous damage to the na- tional security interests of the United States,” said Cheney, a former Defense secretary who as vice president helped oversee the nation’s response to the 9/ 11 terrorist attacks in 2001.

Asked whether he thinks Snowden is a Chinese spy, Cheney replied: “I’m deeply suspicious, obviously, because he went to China. That’s not a place where you would ordinarily want to go if you are interested in freedom, liberty and so forth.”

On CBS’ Face the Nation, White House chief of staff Denis McDonough said it was too soon to know how much damage the leaks had done, but he said the disclosure “in effect gives the playbook to those who would like to get around our techniques and our practices.”

President Obama said he doesn’t believe that the NSA’s sweeping collection of telephone records violates Americans’ privacy, McDonough said. He said Obama would discuss the issue publicly “in the days ahead.”