WASHINGTON (NYTIMES) – US President Donald Trump said on Saturday (Aug 15) that he would consider pardoning Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who faced criminal charges after leaking classified documents about vast government surveillance.

“There are many, many people – it seems to be a split decision – many people think that he should somehow be treated differently and other people think he did very bad things,” Mr Trump said during a news conference at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. “I’m going to take a very good look at it.”

The remarks signal a shift for the President, who repeatedly denigrated Snowden as a “traitor” and a “spy who should be executed” in the years before his election.

The disclosures by Snowden, who sought asylum in Russia in 2013, set off a broad debate about surveillance and privacy.

Critics have accused Snowden of treason for revealing classified information, while privacy and civil liberties advocates have praised him for exposing the scope of the government’s surveillance programmes, which included sweeping up phone records of American citizens and eavesdropping on foreign leaders.

Speculation about a pardon for Snowden has grown since the President commented on the case in an interview with the New York Post on Thursday.

“There are a lot of people that think that he is not being treated fairly,” Mr Trump said in the interview. “I mean, I hear that.”

For Snowden, a pardon would be a chance to return to the United States.

In 2013, he was charged with violating the Espionage Act, which carries a prison sentence.

As long as he faces those charges, Snowden has said, he will not return to the United States.

Human rights groups urged then President Barack Obama to pardon Snowden, but they had no success.

Also on Saturday, Mr Trump, asked whether he still had confidence in the leadership of Defence Secretary Mark Esper, appeared to mock his Pentagon chief.

“Yesper? Did you call him Yesper? Some people call him Yesper,” Mr Trump replied. “No, I get along with him. I get along with him fine.”

Tensions between Mr Trump and Mr Esper escalated this year when Mr Esper broke publicly with the President over whether federal troops should have been used to control protests that erupted across the country in response to the killing of unarmed black man George Floyd by the police.

Mr Trump has made a habit of assailing top appointees who have left the administration on bad terms, including former defence secretary James Mattis, who resigned in protest in 2018; attorney-general Jeff Sessions, who was forced out in 2018; and national security adviser John Bolton, who stepped down in 2019.

Pushed further by a journalist to answer whether he had ever considered firing Mr Esper, Mr Trump simply shrugged.

“I consider firing everybody at some point,” the President said.

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