Constitutional Law

Biden: U.S. trying to stop WikiLeaks disclosures

By By The Associated Press

WASHINGTON ? Vice President Joe Biden says the Justice Department is looking at what the U.S. can do to stop more document releases from WikiLeaks.

Biden says he won't comment on that process, but has strong words about WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Biden says if Assange conspired to get classified documents with a member of the U.S. military, then "that's fundamentally different" than if a reporter were given classified material by a source.

The vice president told NBC's "Meet the Press" that he would argue Assange was closer to being "a high-tech terrorist" in this case, as opposed to a government leaker of information such as in the Pentagon Papers case. In 1971, the federal government was rebuffed by the U.S. Supreme Court when officials tried to stop The New York Times and The Washington Post from publishing the so-called Pentagon Papers, a government study about U.S. involvement in Vietnam leaked to the press.

An Army private is suspected of passing classified information to WikiLeaks.

Full post as published by First Amendment Center on December 19, 2010 (boomark / email).