Farley Weiss is the past President of The National Council of Young Israel and an intellectual property attorney.
The first main issue raised by Tucker Carlson in his interview with U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee was Jonathan Pollard, and how Ambassador Huckabee had previously supported his release from prison and met with him a few months ago at Pollard's request. Carlson proceeded to claim numerous outrageously false things about Pollard, (just like he did later with his false allegations against President Herzog visiting Jeffrey Epstein).
It is important to correct the record about Pollard and refute the absurd lies told by Carlson. This article will do just that.
Carlson falsely claimed in the interview that Pollard sold American battle plans against the Soviet Union to Israel and then Carlson claimed that Israel absurdly gave such information to the Soviet Union (who was an enemy of Israel at the time!). Carlson subsequently called Pollard the "worse traitor in U.S. history". Carlson's claim that former CIA director Bill Casey put forth this allegation was completely disproved by the declassification of the 1987 CIA damage assessment of Pollard in which the CIA determined that Pollard and Israel showed no interest in any U.S. military information, and only asked Pollard to obtain information on U.S. intelligence concerning its Arab enemies and the Soviet Union. They also did not see any evidence that Israel transferred to the Soviet Union any information Israel obtained from Pollard.
Carlson's claims are further completely contradicted by the U.S. Justice Department prosecutors of Pollard, who in their victim impact statement to the court claimed that the damage Pollard caused was that “Mr. Pollard’s unauthorized disclosures have threatened the U.S. [sic] relations with numerous Middle East Arab allies … The obvious result of Mr. Pollard’s largesse is that U.S. bargaining leverage with the Israeli government in any further intelligence exchanges has been undermined. In short, Mr. Pollard’s activities have adversely affected US relations with both its Middle East Arab allies and the government of Israel."
The Justice Department statement was consistent with their indictment of Pollard in which they charged him on one count of giving classified information to an ally without intending to harm the U.S..
Huckabee accurately stated that the average sentence for what Pollard had done was 2-4 years in prison. The Prosecutors agreed in a plea bargain with Pollard not to seek a life sentence and because the Government's submission of two Affidavits (which were false) by anti-Israel former Secretary of Defense Weinberger, to the court, they got Federal Judge Aubrey Robinson to ignore the plea bargain and give Pollard a life sentence.
A federal judge can legally ignore a plea bargain, something which a State Court Judge is not allowed to do. Pollard appealed through Habeas Corpus because his attorney did not file a direct appeal of the false affidavits submitted by Weinberger and Pollard lost the appeal 2-1 with the two Jewish judges, Lawrence Silberman and Ruth Bader Ginsburgh, deciding against Pollard. Judge Stephen Williams dissented and called the life sentence given Pollard a "fundamental miscarriage of Justice".
It is noteworthy that later on, Weinberger himself received a pardon from President George H.W. Bush after facing a trial for perjury and obstruction of justice in the Iran Contra affair.
Former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey reviewed the Pollard case and wrote that Pollard’s only motive was to help Israel, without any intent to harm the U.S. Mukasey favored Pollard's release from prison. Numerous American officials, who knew what the damage Pollard did was about, completely contradicted the claims Weinberger made in his court filings in which Weinberger claimed that "in the year of the spy, no one did anything worse than Pollard."
The absurdity of Weinberger's statement was the fact that the same year Ronald Pelton was convicted of providing (for $35,000) the Soviet Union with National Security Agency defense and intelligence secrets, including US efforts on tapping Soviet communications. Pelton’s spying led to his receiving three life terms from the sentencing judge. Pelton, however, served the same years in prison as Pollard, 30 years, and was released one week after Pollard with no parole conditions, unlike the onerous five years of wearing a wrist bracelet and confinement to a small area of NY that Pollard had. It is noteworthy that Pelton was also known to have a photographic memory, something Pollard did not have.
Robert McFarlane, President Reagan's National Security Adviser when Pollard was arrested, wrote that the life sentence given to Pollard was a result of Weinberger’s “unbalanced reasoning" regarding Israel and constituted a “great injustice."
*The head of the Senate Intelligence Committee at the time of Pollard's arrest, David Durenberger, wrote that he had objected to Pollard’s life sentence and disagreed with Weinberger’s “vehemence" against him.
*Assistant Secretary of Defense Lawrence Korb wrote that Pollard’s life sentence was wrong, and attributed it to Weinberger’s “visceral dislike" of Israel.
In other words, they all viewed Weinberger’s actions, with the help of the Justice Department prosecutors, as contrary to U.S. national interests.
It is noteworthy that virtually every major U.S. official at the time of Pollard’s arrest-those who best knew the ramifications of his actions-have written or commented that they supported his release from prison. These officials include Secretary of State George Schultz, Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence chairman Lee Hamilton, and FBI (and subsequent CIA) director William Webster.
James Woolsey, who was CIA director during Bill Clinton’s presidency, eventually became a strong advocate for Pollard’s release and implied that his continued incarceration was due to anti-Semitism. Senator Dennis DeConcini headed Senate intelligence and not only advocated for Pollard's release but even signed an affidavit with McFarlane after Pollard served thirty years in prison to say he was no longer a security threat.
Phillip Heymann, Deputy Attorney General under President Clinton, wrote that he thoroughly reviewed the Pollard case. He wrote that “Pollard’s conviction was justified but his sentence was entirely out-of-line with others engaging in similar behavior and it was made less-than-legitimate by a treacherous recommendation of the then Secretary of Defense," wrote Heymann. “There is no evidence that Pollard intended to harm the United States or help its enemies."
The U.S. has had numerous evil spies like former CIA traitor Aldrich Ames and former FBI Agent Robert Hanson that literally caused the death of U.S. agents in the Soviet Union. The evidence is clear that Tucker Carlson's claims about Pollard and the damage he caused do not remotely compare to what Ames, Hanson, Pelton and others caused.
It is obvious that Tucker Carlson has both an extraordinary incompetent team of researchers who failed to do basic research on Jonathan Pollard. It is also obvious that he is antisemitic in attempting to state as fact so many things that the record clearly shows are false about Jonathan Pollard. Tucker Carlson's false allegations against Israel and Jews are partially responsible for the rise of antisemitism in America.
If Tucker Carlson cares about the accuracy of what he says and his own already badly tarnished reputation, he should promptly correct the record. However, his subsequent antisemitic in an interview with a Saudi Arabian news outlet makes it very unlikely that Carlson will change his ways.