A 63-year-old Air Force employee has been indicted for providing classified information about Ukraine to a person claiming to be a woman on a foreign dating app from February 2022 to April 2022.
David Franklin Slater of Nebraska, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, passed the classified material to a “woman” who called him her “secret love informant” and her “secret agent.”
According to the indictment, Slater participated in USSTRATCOM briefings on Russia’s war against Ukraine classified as TOP SECRET//SENSITIVE COMPARTMENTED INFORMATION (TS//SCI).
“Slater then transmitted the confidential NDI he had learned from those briefings via the foreign online dating site’s messaging platform to his co-conspirator, who claimed to be a woman living in Ukraine on the foreign dating site,” he said. said the Department of Justice.
According to the Department of Justice: According to the indictment, David Franklin Slater, 63, of Nebraska, worked in restricted space at USSTRATCOM and held a Top Secret security clearance from on or about August 2021 through or about April 2022 , after retiring as a lieutenant. Colonel in the US Army. Slater is alleged to have intentionally, improperly, and illegally transmitted an NDI classified as “SECRET,” which he had reason to believe could be used to the detriment of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign nation, on a foreign online dating platform. to a person not authorized to receive such information.
“As alleged, Mr. Slater, a civilian employee of the Air Force and retired lieutenant colonel of the U.S. Army, knowingly transmitted classified national defense information to another person in flagrant disregard for the security of his country and his oath to safeguard its secrets,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “The Department of Justice will seek to hold accountable those who knowingly and willfully put their country at risk by disclosing classified information.”
“Some responsibilities rest with individuals who have access to Top Secret information. The charges against Mr. Slater call into question whether he has betrayed those responsibilities,” said U.S. Attorney Susan Lehr for the District of Nebraska. “We look forward to continuing our work with the FBI and the Office of Special Investigations of the Air Force to guarantee the security of our country”.
“The FBI investigates those who choose to unlawfully use their access to classified information to jeopardize our national security,” said Special Agent in Charge Eugene Kowel of the FBI Omaha Field Office. “When people violate the trust given to them to safeguard our nation’s intelligence, they put our country at risk. We will continue to work side by side with our partners to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution by safeguarding our country’s classified information.”
The laws apply only to little ones.
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Biden also shared classified information with his ghostwriter Mark Zwonitzer on at least three occasions.
According to special prosecutor Robert Hur, in 2017, Joe Biden read aloud classified passages about Situation Room meetings to his ghostwriter Mark Zwonitzer “per word on at least three occasions” — and Biden has not yet been charged.