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Following several months of insinuation that he is a criminal or an accomplice to a crime, journalist Glenn Greenwald told Salon's Brian Beutler that he plans to return to the United States, essentially on a dare. "I’m going to go back to the U.S. for many reasons, but just the fucking principle is enough," Greenwald said. "On principle I’m going to force the issue."

It was actually a journalist who was among the first to publicly suggest that Greenwald should perhaps face criminal charges for reporting on files leaked from the NSA by Edward Snowden. In June, only weeks after the reports began, Greenwald appeared on NBC's Meet the Press, where David Gregory asked Greenwald: "To the extent that you have aided and abetted Snowden, even in his current movements, why shouldn't you … be charged with a crime." "I think it's pretty extraordinary," Greenwald replied, "that anybody who would call themselves a journalist would publicly muse about whether or not other journalists should be charged with felonies."

That theme, however, quickly became a central aspect of critique from members of the government. At the end of January, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper referred obliquely to "accomplices" to Snowden, obviously meaning Greenwald and, possibly, other reporters like The Washington Post's Barton Gellman. Earlier this week, Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, pressed FBI director James Comey on the topic, implying that Greenwald had been "selling … access to this material to both newspaper outlets and other places." "Mr. Comey," Rogers asked, "to the best of your knowledge, is fencing stolen material — is that a crime?"