Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian reporter who broke the NSA story and became a household name, is leaving the esteemed newspaper to start his own venture, reports Buzzfeed. Greenwald, who did not plan to make an official announcement yet, revealed only that he was approached with "a once-in-a-career dream journalistic opportunity that no journalist could possibly decline.”
From Buzzfeed:
Greenwald declined to comment on the precise scale of the new venture or on its budget, but he said it would be “a very well-funded… very substantial new media outlet.” He said the source of funding will be public when the venture is officially announced.
“My role, aside from reporting and writing for it, is to create the entire journalism unit from the ground up by recruiting the journalists and editors who share the same journalistic ethos and shaping the whole thing — but especially the political journalism part — in the image of the journalism I respect most,” he said.
Greenwald, who is also a lawyer, began blogging “sort of spontaneously” in 2005, focusing on issues surrounding cybersecurity and government surveillance. Greenwald joined Salon as a columnist in 2007 and in 2012 left to report for the Guardian, where he went on to reveal the story of Edward Snowden with documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras.
The journalist will continue to live in Brazil, and will operate the site through staff in Rio de Janeiro, New York City, Washington, D.C., and San Francisco; some staff has already been hired. Though he remains focused on political journalism, Greenwald's venture will be a "general media outlet and news site" with entertainment and features that have “no preexisting institutional strictures on what you can do.”
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