A major new exposé by Jane Mayer in The New Yorker magazine has revealed new details about the Obama administration’s attack on whistleblowers. The article focuses on former National Security Agency analyst Thomas Drake, who is being prosecuted for leaking information about waste and mismanagement at the agency. The New Yorker reveals the Obama administration has used the Espionage Act of 1917 to press criminal charges in five alleged instances of national security leaks—more such prosecutions than have occurred in all previous administrations combined. Gabriel Schoenfeld of the Hudson Institute said, “Ironically, Obama has presided over the most draconian crackdown on leaks in our history—even more so than Nixon.” Yale University Professor of Constitutional Law Jack Balkin said the increase in leak prosecutions is part of a larger transformation, what he described as bipartisan normalization and legitimization of a national surveillance state.