THE MONTHLY NEWSLETTER OF THE OVERSEAS PRESS CLUB OF AMERICA, NEW YORK, NY • June 2013 OPC Urges Obama to End Excessive Secrecy by Susan Kille, Larry Martz and Aimee Vitrak The OPC’s Freedom of the Press Committee has written hundreds of letters to foreign governments pro- testing abuses of the press. It is tes- timony to the success of democracy in America that relatively few such letters have been needed at home. In the past ten years, however, the Committee has written 18 letters complaining of press freedom abus- es by the Bush and Obama admin- istrations. A year ago, the Commit- President Obama announced a review of press freedom guidelines tee organized a panel in Washington during a major speech on defense and security on May 23. D.C., co-sponsored with the Na- He set a deadline of 12 July for a response. tional Press Club, calling attention to President Obama’s prosecution of its reach with journalists had stopped six government whistle-blowers un- there, but on the heels of the AP re- OPC Letter to Obama der the Espionage Act – more than port arrived news of a Fox News re- all such cases put together since the porter. James Rosen broke the news May 28, 2013 Act was passed in 1917. But the May that North Korea was planning mis- Dear Mr. President: 13 disclosure that the Department of sile launches in fierce defiance of the Justice has subpoenaed two months U.N. Security Council’s 2009 con- The Overseas Press Club of of records from 2012 of more than demnation of Pyongyang’s nuclear America thanks you for your ac- 20 telephone lines used by AP re- program. knowledgement that “journalists porters triggered outrage among The DOJ searched Rosen’s per- should not be at legal risk for do- defenders of press freedom and this sonal e-mails and spied on his move- ing their jobs,” which we believe Committee. And if only the news of ments in an investigation that led to should be the standard for the Unit- the federal government overstepping the indictment of State Department ed States and every other nation. security adviser Stephen Jin-Woo Recent leak investigations, particu- Inside. Kim on charges of disclosing nation- larly the probes into Fox News and al defense information. the Associated Press, have indeed Kamber Book Night Recap.............3 Between these two disclosures overstepped the customary boundar- People..........................................5-8 came conflicting messages from ies that have safeguarded reporters President Obama. On May 16, pursuing legitimate stories on what People Remembered......................8 Obama said he had “no apologies” the government is doing, and we are for launching investigations into gratified that you have called for re- Profile: George Bookman................9 national security threats and offered consideration of these policies. AP and the Fourth Estate................10 “complete confidence” in Attorney We remain troubled, however, General Eric Holder. He declined to that you have entrusted this re- Berlinica Book Night......................10 comment on the case, but defended thinking to Attorney General Eric Film Recap.....................................11 the seizure of records in broad terms: H. Holder Jr., in effect asking him “U.S. national security is depen- to investigate himself and his own New Books....................................12 (Continued on Page 2) (Continued on Page 4) (Continued From Page 1) shield law to guard against government overreach. And dent on those folks being able to operate with confidence I’ve raised these issues with the Attorney General, who that folks back home have their backs, so they’re not just shares my concerns. So he has agreed to review existing left out there high and dry, and potentially put in even Department of Justice guidelines governing investiga- more danger than they may already be. And so I make no tions that involve reporters, and he’ll convene a group of apologies, and I don’t think the American people would media organizations to hear their concerns as part of that expect me as Commander-in-Chief not to be concerned review. And I’ve directed the Attorney General to report about information that might compromise their missions back to me by July 12th.” The troubling aspects of this statement are how the or might get them killed. DOJ leaks will be investigated, the limits of a shield law “Now, the flip side of it is we also live in a democracy and the person charged with leading the investigation. where a free press, free expression and the open flow of To aid the DOJ investigation, phone records were information helps hold me accountable, helps hold our seized that could have assisted in ascertaining where government accountable, and helps our democracy func- security leaks might have originated. Record seizure is tion. And the whole reason I got involved in politics is an effective tool in rooting out the broad term “national because I believe so deeply in that democracy and that security,” so there’s no reason the government would re- process.” fuse to invoke a resource to protect vague “national in- Obama channeled both sides of the argument in the terests.” Rose Garden that day but left many in the media uneasy Shield laws only protect a reporter’s privilege from with the “no apologies” statement, which became the revealing sources and documents. The Privacy Protec- headline of his speech. Then, on May 23, Obama deliv- tion Act of 1980 and the present Free Flow of Infor- ered his first major speech on counterterrorism and it in- mation Act — similar to shield laws in most states that cluded his parameters, for now, for journalists: Charles Schumer is working to reintroduce to Congress “I believe we must keep information secret that pro- — do not prevent a phone company or Internet service tects our operations and our people in the field. To do provider from handing over data on its customers; this so, we must enforce consequences for those who break information is technically third-party information and the law and breach their commitment to protect classi- can be had with a subpoena. In the AP case, the subpoena fied information. But a free press is also essential for our was issued in secret without the AP’s knowledge; in the democracy. That’s who we are. And I’m troubled by the Fox News case, the DOJ said notification of the subpoe- possibility that leak investigations may chill the inves- na was sent three years ago to News Corp., the parent tigative journalism that holds government accountable. company of Fox News, but News Corp. has refuted this “Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their claim. jobs. Our focus must be on those who break the law. Finally, the very person who oversees the DOJ has And that’s why I’ve called on Congress to pass a media (Continued on Page 4) OVERSEAS PRESS CLUB OF AMERICA • BOARD OF GOVERNORS PRESIDENT SECRETARY Deidre Depke Santiago Lyon ASSOCIATE BOARD PAST PRESIDENTS Michael Serrill Jonathan Dahl Executive Editor VP and Director of MEMBERS EX-OFFICIO Assistant Managing Former Editor-in-Chief The Daily Beast Photography Brian Byrd David A. Andelman Editor Smart Money Associated Press Program Officer John Corporon Bloomberg Markets Adam B. Ellick NYS Health Allan Dodds Frank ACTIVE BOARD *Video and Print Marcus Mabry Foundation Alexis Gelber FIRST VICE PRESIDENT Jacqueline Albert- Journalist Editor at Large William J. Holstein Tim Ferguson Simon The New York Times International Herald Emma Daly Marshall Loeb Editor U.S. Bureau Chief * on leave attending Tribune Communications Larry Martz Forbes Asia Politique Internationale Harvard Kennedy School Director Roy Rowan John Martin Human Rights Watch Leonard Saffir SECOND VICE PRESIDENT Amar C. Bakshi Arlene Getz Writer/Editor Larry Smith Abigail Pesta JD/MBA student Editor-in-Charge, Media Sarah Lubman Richard B. Stolley Freelance Journalist Yale University Thomson Reuters Romesh Ratnesar Partner Deputy Editor Brunswick Group EXECUTIVE THIRD VICE PRESIDENT Rebecca Azmat Khan Bloomberg DIRECTOR Toni Reinhold Blumenstein Senior Digital Producer Businessweek Minky Worden Sonya K. Fry Editor in Charge, Deputy Editor in Chief Al Jazeera Director of Global New York Desk The Wall Street Journal Tom Squitieri Initiatives EDITOR Reuters Evelyn Leopold Freelance Journalist Human Rights Watch Aimee Vitrak Paul Brandus Independent Journalist TREASURER West Wing Report United Nations Seymour Topping Abi Wright OPC Dorinda Elliott Emeritus Director ISSN-0738-7202 Global Affairs Editor Howard Chua-Eoan Dafna Linzer Professor of Alfred I. duPont – Copyright © 2002 Conde Nast Traveler Former News Director Managing Editor International Columbia University Over seas Press Club of Time MSNBC.com Journalism Awards America Columbia University 40 West 45 Street, New York, NY 10036 USA • Phone: (212) 626-9220 • Fax: (212) 626-9210 • Website: opcofamerica.org OPC Bulletin • June 2013 • Page 2 Photojournalists Come Out to Support Kamber’s Book EVENT RECAP: MAY 15 by Aimee Vitrak There was a palpable “wow” factor happening in the 25CPW Gallery on May 15 as Michael Kamber’s five- year project had been finalized in his book, Photojour- nalists on War. The gallery space was large and allowed for series of photos from various journalists featured in the book to be displayed along with quotes from the pho- tojournalists on what it’s like to cover war. Andrea Bruce’s photos were displayed with this quote: “I started to divide my life into two different realms. I have a bulletproof vest and I travel with ten ©Benjamin Petit/Haytham Pictures thousand dollars in my sock. I wear an abaya half the Michael Kamber, center, rests a hand on David Carr, time and my helmet the other half, like some sort of de- media reporter for The New York Times, who introduced ranged superhero or something.” This exhibition was the Kamber and spoke about the book.