Edward Snowden is “not counting on” Barack Obama issuing him a presidential pardon before Donald Trump moves into the White House on Jan. 20, but he appears to like his chances.
“The possibility for a pardon, it seems to every expert who’s looked at this issue, has never been more likely,” he said. “And this is a surprise to myself more than anyone else, I think.”
Yahoo Global News Anchor Katie Couric traveled to Russia for an exclusive interview with Snowden, the exiled former NSA contractor, who took the time to discuss everyone from President-elect Donald Trump to President Obama.
Snowden said he thinks it is possible that Russians hacked the DNC and the email accounts of Hillary Clinton’s campaign staffers, but that he doesn’t know for sure.
“I don’t know. But as somebody who worked in intelligence, I certainly think it’s possible. They definitely have the capabilities,” Snowden said. “But what bothers me about this kind of conversation is that the last time there was a significant hack that affected the United States that we believed had an association to a nation state, it was the Sony hack, which we said North Korea was behind. The FBI immediately released evidence that they believed proved that they were behind that attack. We haven’t seen that here. And I think if we’re going to have this conversation, it should be evidence-based.”
Snowden also slammed former CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus, who is under consideration to become Trump’s secretary of state for disclosing “information that was far more highly classified than I ever did” without spending any time in jail.
As for Trump himself, Snowden told Couric, “I wonder when it is that he thinks America was great.”
He also said that he has never met Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“I have not met Vladimir Putin. This is kind of a surprising thing. I mean, in the U.S., the number of people who meet the president is pretty limited. He’s a busy guy. He’s got a lot going on. But people seem to think that I’m going ice skating with Vladimir Putin in Red Square, you know, every weekend or riding polar bears over the tundra. Yeah, no, I’ve never met the Russian president, I have no intention to,” he told Couric.
Watch the video below.