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Hard reality: Winner pleading out for 63-month sentence
hotair.com ^ | Posted at 2:01 pm on June 26, 2018 | Ed Morrissey

Posted on 06/26/2018 12:53:03 PM PDT by Red Badger

She wanted to “burn the White House down” and leaked classified information to an inept reporter by hiding it in her pantyhose in an attempt to punish Donald Trump. Instead, Reality Winner will spend 63 months in the Big House after taking a plea deal in Trump’s efforts to crack down on leakers. This morning, the tawdry story of an NSA employee and her not-so-secret affinity for the Iranian regime came to an end with a whimper instead of a bang:

See Also: Today’s hot topics: Travel ban, NIFLA, immigration, Arlene’s Flowers, and more!

Reality L. Winner, a former Air Force linguist who was the first person prosecuted by the Trump administration on charges of leaking classified information, pleaded guilty on Tuesday as part of an agreement with prosecutors that calls for a sentence of 63 months in prison.

Ms. Winner, who entered her plea in Federal District Court in Augusta, Ga., was arrested last June and accused of sharing a classified report about Russian interference in the 2016 election with the news media.

Ms. Winner, who is now 26, has been jailed since her arrest. Her decision to plead guilty to one felony count allows the government both to avoid a complex trial that had been scheduled for October and to notch a victory in the Trump administration’s aggressive pursuit of leakers.

“All of my actions I did willfully, meaning I did so of my own free will,” Ms. Winner said in court on Tuesday.

Not without some encouragement from — and incompetence by — a reporter at The Intercept. Rather than re-render the documents, the outlet reproduced them instead, making it easy for investigators to conclude that Winner was the leaker. Not that she was exactly a model of subtlety either; while working with a Top Secret clearance, she was cheering on the mullahs of Iran and writing down her plans to burn down the White House and join the Taliban in Afghanistan. Winner then admitted to the crime in recorded jailhouse conversations with her mother while telling her sister that she’d get bail because, er …

Prosecutors said a phone call to her sister expressed Winner’s confidence in how to play the court during her bond hearing.

“I’m pretty, white and cute,” she allegedly told her sister. Prosecutors said Winner told her sister she would braid her hair and cry in court.

Prosecutors said she also instructed family members to transfer $30,000 into her mother’s account so she’d appear poor enough for a court-appointed attorney.

A criminal mastermind she ain’t.

Winner didn’t get a very lenient deal, either. A single count under 18 USC 793 carries a potential ten-year prison sentence. The deal Winner accepted is just over half of that in prison, followed by three years of probation. She might not have gotten much more than that had she fought the charges. The facts of the case, and her behavior before and after the leak, made it beneficial for her to get out from under this as quickly and as quietly as possible.

Her mother worries that her reputation will be ruined:

“She said she wants the world to know that she does love her country, and she is a patriot,” she said. “I don’t want her to go down in history as a traitor to her country.”

Winner must be one of those patriots that support America’s enemies on the battlefield and plan to burn down government buildings out of luuuuuurve. Not even Chelsea Manning went that far, and he went far enough into moral treason territory to qualify. To the extent history remembers Winner at all, the best outcome for which she can hope is that she’ll be considered a narcissistic idiot that lacked the capacity for real treason. Under the circumstances, that seems pretty generous.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Government; Politics/Elections; US: District of Columbia
KEYWORDS: 18usc793; iran; nsa; realitywinner; theintercept
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To: Red Badger

I wonder if she plans on changing her name to Loser.

Looks like someone who bet her future on a Hillary win.


21 posted on 06/26/2018 1:35:29 PM PDT by Hillarys Gate Cult (When words can mean anything, they can also mean nothing.)
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To: Red Badger
Reality L. Winner, a former Air Force linguist who was the first person prosecuted by the Trump administration on charges of leaking classified information...

Reality is a bitch.

And, she's first, she's a winner!

22 posted on 06/26/2018 1:36:32 PM PDT by Pearls Before Swine ("Married with children.")
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To: damper99
I wouldn't have an objection to an IQ test; as long as it was known whether the choice would be from the top applicants or the bottom applicants.
23 posted on 06/26/2018 1:38:31 PM PDT by Attention Surplus Disorder (Apoplectic is where we want them)
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To: Red Badger
I'm having a real problem believing this retard "Reality Winner" is fluent in "the Persian language and in Dari, the Persian dialect spoken in Afghanistan, as well as in Pashto".

If she was smart enough to learn that guttural BS, she would have been smart enough to realize she was going to get caught, the Feds have tight control on who has access to stuff.

There are probably thousands of useless "linguists" working for Uncle Sam, no different than the fake sign language guy at the Mandela funeral

Rot in hell you stupid commie bitch.

24 posted on 06/26/2018 1:39:32 PM PDT by Rome2000 (SMASH THE CPUSA-SIC SEMPER TYRANNIS-CLOSE ALL MOSQUES-GOD WITH US)
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To: Red Badger

Bet she won’t get a presidential pardon.


25 posted on 06/26/2018 1:45:50 PM PDT by servantboy777
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To: TangoLimaSierra

Finally a sentence with heft


26 posted on 06/26/2018 1:46:59 PM PDT by Conserv
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To: servantboy777

Ya think?????....................


27 posted on 06/26/2018 1:47:57 PM PDT by Red Badger (When Obama and VJ go to prison for treason, will Roseanne get her show back?...)
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To: Red Badger

She should have gotten the rope.


28 posted on 06/26/2018 1:48:20 PM PDT by CodeToad
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To: CodeToad

At a minimum................


29 posted on 06/26/2018 1:49:17 PM PDT by Red Badger (When Obama and VJ go to prison for treason, will Roseanne get her show back?...)
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To: Red Badger

Prosecutors said a phone call to her sister expressed Winner’s confidence in how to play the court during her bond hearing.

“I’m pretty, white and cute,” she allegedly told her sister.

She forgot “stupid”.


30 posted on 06/26/2018 1:52:52 PM PDT by Flick Lives (Suddenly someone'll say, like, plate, or shrimp, or plate o' shrimp out of the blue, no explanation.)
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To: Red Badger

Her mom is a gdam idiot.

And she is a traitor.

Only wish Hitlery could be there with her.


31 posted on 06/26/2018 1:57:20 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man ( Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: TangoLimaSierra

All women think this. They all think the pussy pass will always work.

It usually does, as they only get about a third of the sentences men get for the same or comparable crimes.


32 posted on 06/26/2018 1:59:00 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man ( Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: pgkdan

Note she didn’t say she was smart.


33 posted on 06/26/2018 1:59:48 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man ( Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: Red Badger

At a minimum................

-x-x-x-x-x-x-
After 72 hours in the pillory.....


34 posted on 06/26/2018 2:27:49 PM PDT by S.O.S121.500 (Had ENOUGH Yet ? ........................ Enforce the Bill of Rights .........It is the LAW...)
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To: Red Badger
I wonder if they will issue a REALITY WINNER Cabbage Patch Doll. She's got the exact face for it. Compare these pics and tell me she wasn't born to be a Cabbage Patch Reality Doll.


35 posted on 06/26/2018 2:58:20 PM PDT by Blue Highway
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To: Red Badger

She pleaded ‘guilty’ to leaking. Does anyone have her prison address? (I want to send her a package of Depends)


36 posted on 06/26/2018 2:59:22 PM PDT by Oscar in Batangas (12:01 PM 1/20/2017...The end of an error.)
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To: Red Badger

Five years in a women’s prison probably won’t be that tough on a hard bodied young carpet muncher like Winner.


37 posted on 06/26/2018 3:24:57 PM PDT by your other brother
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To: Red Badger

It's like an indoor gay pride parade.
Red Badger but not in the same sense Red Badger but not in the same sense Red Badger but not in the same sense Red Badger but not in the same sense

38 posted on 06/26/2018 3:25:23 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (www.tapatalk.com/groups/godsgravesglyphs/, forum.darwincentral.org, www.gopbriefingroom.com)
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To: Red Badger

It is a good first step.

But Hillary did much worse, and nothing has happened to her yet.


39 posted on 06/26/2018 3:25:51 PM PDT by marktwain (President Trump and his supporters are the Resistance. His opponents are the Reactionaries.)
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To: The Toll

“I don’t want her to go down in history as a traitor to her country.”
But....she is a traitor to her country.

I think she was more focused on the, “going down” aspect of her plea as to how her daughter will be remembered but, I could be wrong.


40 posted on 06/26/2018 3:30:21 PM PDT by outofsalt (If history teaches us anything, it's that history rarely teaches us anything.)
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