The story of a patriot who dreamed of serving her country—but who was nearly destroyed by it.
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“Reality Winner is, without a doubt, a hero for these times. When it mattered the most, she chose truth over deception—and paid a terrible price. Read her story and let it move you, infuriate you, and inspire you.”—Chelsea Handler, New York Times bestselling author of Life Will Be the Death of Me
“In her provocative and engrossing memoir, I Am Not Your Enemy, young military veteran and whistleblower Reality Winner recounts her impulsive choice to leak to the press a NSA document detailing Russian interference in the 2016 election for U.S. President, and the harrowing consequences of that ill-considered act of naïve patriotism. Reality Winner’s Kafkaesque journey through American courtrooms, jails and prisons reveals the plight of whistleblowers under draconian laws and a conspiracy of silence in the face of injustice. I Am Not Your Enemy offers a unique and urgent story of what happened to a young woman who spoke out against the power of the state, and her unforgettable journey to rock-bottom in prison during the COVID pandemic, and back home to Texas to regain her life.”—Piper Kerman, author of Orange Is the New Black
“A brilliant and excruciatingly necessary book for the moment we are in. Because the only way we are going to survive this current madness is for all of us to find the courage that Reality has shown us and act accordingly. Her only crime was that she learned we were being lied to and she decided that we, the citizens, should know the truth. That she was sent to prison for this is one of the most shameful acts I have seen in my lifetime. When you finish reading her amazing and inspiring story, you too will know the truth of this book’s title: Far from her having to proclaim ‘I Am Not Your Enemy,’ we now know she is exactly the opposite of an ‘enemy’—that she is, quite frankly, the American hero we’ve been waiting for.”—Michael Moore, Academy Award–winning filmmaker and bestselling author
“Reading Reality Winner’s clearheaded, lucid prose, all you think is ‘How’d this profoundly well-meaning, super-capable person end up in prison?’ And then she tells you. A truly demented fable of patriotism and where it can lead you.”—Ira Glass, This American Life
“I Am Not Your Enemy is a book that reveals how the bargains we make with the government—when we cede human generosity to the fearsome specter of state power—are rarely worth it. Try to take back what you’ve given, and there is always a price to pay.”—New York Times
“Winner eloquently defends her choices [and] takes full responsibility . . . This is important and cautionary testimony.”—Booklist (starred)
“This personable and wide-ranging memoir lets [Winner] define herself on her own terms, offering an expressive, irreverent tour of America from the halls of power to cramped prison cells.”—New York Times Editor’s Choice
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Reality Winner was a twenty-five-year-old translator for the NSA when she read a classified document revealing what she assumed would make headlines during a time of unprecedented leaking: After blatant lies by the Trump administration and public silence by the NSA, there had in fact been foreign interference in the 2016 US election. In a breach of NSA protocol, she impulsively printed it, smuggled it out of the building, and mailed it to The Intercept<, which published it and then promptly informed the NSA. For her crime, she received the longest prison sentence ever imposed on a government-affiliated employee convicted of a single count of leaking classified information and spent more than four years in federal prison.
Now, for the first time, Winner tells her own story: her unusual childhood in South Texas, with a brilliant but unstable father whose obsession with politics, ancient history, philosophy, and religion sparked her own interests in ancient civilizations and the study of foreign languages, including Latin, Arabic, Farsi, Dari, and Pashto; her patriotism, after 9/11, which led her to enlist in the Air Force and join the NSA, where the work she did in the hope of protecting American security was part of the US campaign in Afghanistan; and, most movingly, her life in the American prison system and how it nearly broke her.
I Am Not Your Enemy is Winner’s bold, brave examination of the moral choices that compel us to act, as well as an account of the risks one young woman took to protect her country and the price she paid for it. It is also a powerful argument for standing up for what you believe in during uncertain times—an inspiring message as relevant now as it was when she made her fateful decision.
A brilliant linguist, devout patriot, voracious reader, and fitness and yoga enthusiast, Reality Winner was a US Air Force veteran working at the NSA when she leaked a classified document containing revelations about the 2016 US presidential election. Today she is a CrossFit coach living in South Texas and studying to become a licensed veterinary technologist.