JESSELYN RADACK: As we presented the award, we each read from various other famous people in history, including Martin Luther King, who—people who were also smeared as being traitors and turncoats and hurting the country, and later history realized they were heroes—other people, like Ben Franklin. We talked about that with him and how he was supported, that despite what the U.S. government is saying about 60 percent of our country is in support of NSA reform.

And I think, despite all that he’s dealing with, he is incredibly focused on whistleblower protection, on surveillance reform and on journalist-source confidentiality. So even though he has all of these other things going on, for him, he is incredibly focused on surveillance reform and that it be meaningful. And while there are a number of bills before Congress right now, most of them focus on the PATRIOT Act Section 215 and very little on FISA Section 702.

So he was very well versed, very centered, very balanced and very engaging, and has a wicked sense of humor, which was very, very fun. So I think, you know, we both felt mutually supported, and he knows that he’s not alone and that he has a lot of people in the United States and around the world who are supporting his endeavors.

AMY GOODMAN: You mention Benjamin Franklin, and I wanted to turn to Coleen Rowley, a former FBI agent, in Minneapolis, was awarded Time Person of the Year for her work around 9/11. She was a division legal counsel for 13 years and taught constitutional rights to FBI and police, also testified before Congress about the FBI’s failure to help prevent the 9/11 attacks. Coleen, what does Ben Franklin have to do with Edward Snowden?

COLEEN ROWLEY: Well, most people would not have any way of knowing that, significantly, that one of the Founding Fathers of our country was vilified exactly the same and for the same reason as Edward Snowden. In 1773 or ’74, Ben Franklin was postmaster general, and it came to his attention that there were communications between the British and the colonist overseers that American colonists did—would not be accorded the same civil rights as British citizens, and—because they thought they had to keep the American colonists, you know, at bay or whatever, so they were not according American colonists the same rights. And Ben Franklin, to his credit, became a whistleblower in 1773, only to be vilified and called every name in the book by the British and by the American governor at the time. He was actually stripped of his postmaster general status. So we can see how history and time changes everything. And in the case of Ben Franklin, it changed rather quickly.