Bin Laden Filmmakers Got “Unprecedented Access” to National Security Officials

President Obama and his advisers observe the raid that killed Osama bin Laden from the White House. <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/whitehouse/5680724572/" target="_blank">Flickr/White House</a>

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Top Obama administration officials provided details about the raid that killed Osama bin Laden to filmmakers working on a movie about the operation even as the White House was trying to keep those same details out of the media, Bloomberg reports:

The Obama administration promised a Hollywood filmmaker unprecedented access to the top-secret Navy unit that killed Osama bin Laden to help her make a feature film on the operation at the same time it was publicly ordering officials to stop talking about the raid.

The Pentagon’s top intelligence official, Michael Vickers, offered Oscar-winning director Kathryn Bigelow interviews with a member of the SEAL team that helped plan last year’s assault on bin Laden’s compound, according to a transcript of a July 15 meeting that was released yesterday by Judicial Watch, a Washington-based legal organization.

This reflects an ongoing double-standard in how the Obama administration handles information related to national security. This White House is certainly not the first to leak sensitive information with the intention of shaping the media narrative (see Iraq War, the). But the Obama team’s highly selective release of information has been paired with an unusually aggressive pursuit of leakers. The current administration has pursued more leak investigations than all previous administrations combined, including several against individuals who were clearly acting in the public interest

When the government gets involved in a film like this one, it has a great deal of power to shape how the film comes out. The Obama administration is understandably concerned about how this story is told, since it will likely play a significant role in shaping the legacy of the man currently in office. But there’s still something grating and profoundly hypocritical about the discrepancy between how whistleblowers are treated compared to those “authorized” to leak such information.

When the White House is shaping how a story is told, inconvenient information almost invariably gets downplayed or left out. I hope the final film will include at least some acknowledgement of the Pakistani doctor who was just sentenced to thirty years in prison for treason for allegedly helping the CIA locate bin Laden.

Adam Serwer is filling in while Kevin is on vacation.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate