US Rep. John Conyers Jr., “Pentagon Papers” whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg and actor Maggie Gyllenhaal join a chorus of prominent voices calling for an end to mass suspicionless surveillance by the National Security Agency (NSA) in a new short video released by the StopWatching.us coalition. Directed by Brian Knappenberger (We Are Legion: The Story of the Hackivists) and produced by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), the PSA-style video draws parallels between the privacy invasions perpetrated by the Nixon administration and the dragnet telecommunications data collection confirmed this summer by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

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The video, “Stop Watching Us: The Video,” is a call to action released in support of the Stop Watching Us: Rally Against Mass Surveillance being held in Washington, DC, on Saturday, Oct. 26, the 12th anniversary of the Patriot Act. Formed in June 2013, the StopWatching.us coalition is comprised of more than 100 public advocacy organizations and companies from across the political spectrum demanding that Congress investigate the full extent of the NSA's spying programs.

“I’m very honored to help EFF and StopWatching.us get out the word and make the rally in DC as big and as informed as possible,” Knappenberger said. “This is the moment for a large scale debate on the future of this thing we all love, the Internet, the way we communicate, our relationship with our government and how technology and its progress can blend with more traditional notions of privacy, liberty and democracy.”

A diverse cast of media, academic, political and legal figures and truth-speakers unite in the video to sound the alarm over unconstitutional government surveillance. The full list, in order of appearance, includes: 

  • Daniel Ellsberg, “Pentagon Papers” whistleblower
  • Phil Donahue, television talk-show pioneer
  • US Rep. John Conyers Jr., (D-MI), ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee
  • David Segal, executive director of Demand Progress
  • Maggie Gyllenhaal, actor and activist
  • Oliver Stone, director of The Untold History of the United States and Nixon
  • John Cusack, actor and activist
  • Wil Wheaton, actor and writer
  • Molly Crabapple, artist and writer
  • Jesselyn Radack, U.S. Department of Justice whistleblower and national security and human rights director at the Government Accountability Project
  • J. Kirk Wiebe, NSA whistleblower
  • Mark Klein, AT&T whistleblower who revealed the telecommunications company’s collaboration with the NSA in collecting customer data
  • Thomas Drake, NSA whistleblower
  • Cindy Cohn, Legal Director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation
  • Dan Choi, LGBTQ activist and Iraq War veteran
  • Lawrence Lessig, Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School

Thomas Drake and Daniel Choi will also speak at the rally, which begins with a march from Columbus Circle to the Capitol Reflecting Pool at 12 p.m. EST on Saturday, Oct. 26. StopWatching.us will also deliver more than 500,000 signatures opposing the NSA’s mass surveillance to Congress. The coalition is calling for a full Congressional investigation of America’s surveillance programs, reform to federal surveillance law, and accountability from officials responsible for hiding this surveillance from lawmakers and the public.

For more information on the full list of organizations involved in the coalition and the joint letter sent to Congress, please visit: https://stopwatching.us/.

More information about the rally is available here: https://rally.stopwatching.us.

To speak to a StopWatching.us spokesperson about the video, please contact Christina DiPasquale at 202.716.1953 or Christina@fitzgibbonmedia.com.

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