In May 2017, amid allegations of foreign interference in the 2016 presidential election, a contractor for the National Security Agency (NSA) leaked a classified document to the press. The document revealed that Russia had launched two cyber attacks prior to the election, one against a company that sold software related to voter registration, and another against 122 local election officials.
The contractor, an Air Force veteran named Reality Winner, sent the document to The Intercept, a journalism site specializing in reporting leaks. But Winner admits now that she made a crucial miscalculation.
"What I had assumed was they would receive it [and] immediately assume that this was something that was important, that it answered very important questions that the country was having, that it would be protected," she says.
That's not what happened. Instead, in the process of fact-checking the document, the reporters assigned to the story sent the document to the FBI, which sent it to the NSA. The security agency easily identified Winner, a crypto linguist, as the source of the leak.
Looking back now, Winner says her timing could not have been worse; the Trump administration had been combatting a string of leaks. FBI director James Comey and the president "were both saying that they were going to nail the next leaker to the wall," she says. "And then I just happened to be the very next name popping up."
Winner was tried under the Espionage Act of 1917 and received the longest sentence to that point for leaking classified information to a media outlet. She accepted a plea deal, lowering her sentence of 10 years to five. She was released from prison in 2021.
Winner's story has been told in a 2021 documentary Reality Winner, the 2023 film Reality, and in the play Is This A Room, in which actors reenacted the transcript of the FBI interrogation of her. Now, she's looking back in a memoir titled I Am Not Your Enemy. It's not a tell-all, she says, because she's still bound by the non-disclosure agreement she signed with the NSA.
"I am under a lasting ... non-disclosure agreement to never talk about anything that could be related to classified information from my Air Force career as a linguist, and then, moving forward, anything that I had done as an NSA contractor, and furthermore, anything within the four corners of the document that I leaked," she says.
Interview highlights
On what it was like in the Georgia county jail
The conditions of that county jail in Lincoln County, Ga. were abhorrent. ... I had been sheltered and privileged and naïve before that. I did not ever imagine that conditions like that would be considered normal or even good for any American in custody. And I was assured several times over that I was being treated the best and that was the most comfortable county jail in the area.
I was given this plastic mat with this crumpled plastic wool falling out of it [to sleep on]. It was held together with duct tape. That was my mat. … There was one sink, a picnic table that was covered in rust in the center of the room, a toilet that was about three feet away from that picnic table that we were supposed to sit and eat at, and a shower directly by the toilet with a black mold-crusted shower curtain over it. There was something so dystopian about it. … The toilet had a brown bedsheet draped over it so that you didn't have to eat at the table and make eye contact with somebody using the toilet.
On being transferred to a federal prison in Carswell, Texas
My first week there, I felt like I was at Harvard. I couldn't believe how big the compound was. It was two buildings and a very small rec center with a concrete track. … My sensory deprivation of 15, 16 months only existing in one room [in the Georgia county jail], I just remembered walking around Carswell and thinking, I'm going to get lost here every single day. It's just so big.
On experiencing COVID-19 restrictions in prison
We were confined to our cells, which did not have restrooms. So we had to ask 24-7, seven days a week, to go use the restroom from another adult. We were no longer allowed to go outside and our movements were controlled around the unit. We couldn't just shower when we wanted to shower or go use their phones. As they eased up, we were still not allowed outside of the unit. …
The positive mail kept me going. I also had a network where I could just ask for any book I wanted and it would show up. So in addition to getting every single book I heard you talk about on Fresh Air for four years, I was basically the library for everybody in the unit. They would give me their requests and people's books would show up.
On struggling after her release, especially with darkness
For the first time in four years, I had actually seen what a dark room looked like. … I had never been alone in a room before, with the exception of solitary confinement, but that wasn't really alone. So I was just so terrified all the time. I could not feel at ease in any way, shape or form. I never expected that would be something that I would feel. … Nobody tells you that once you get out of prison life just gets harder.
On conflict with her mother after her release
The biggest point of contention between my mother and I was the status of my notoriety and the fact that she had been out for four years doing interviews about me and ... that she felt obligated to tell her Twitter following updates about me while the halfway house was saying, "If your presence is detected on social media, or if we feel like you're communicating on social in any way, or that we feel you're in danger, we will take you back into custody." And my mother had wanted to tweet that I was home. And I said that they would take me back into custody if people knew I was at that home address. And she said that she wanted to be truthful to her following. And I just felt so offended, like the only reason why you had that following was to support me and I'm sitting right here in front of you and you care more about them than me. … I felt like while I was at my most vulnerable, she was still processing things through being interviewed about me instead of being my mom. And, you know, our relationship is still on the mend.
On what she's doing now
I'm a level two CrossFit coach and I am currently going to Texas A&M University Kingsville in the veterinary technology program. … We did have to send attorneys for permission to at least take the state licensing test so that I could help my school out with passing rates, but [as a convicted felon] I will never be a licensed vet tech.
Sam Briger and Susan Nyakundi produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Meghan Sullivan adapted it for the web
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