Washington—Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today released an April 2013 email exchange between then-NSA contractor Edward Snowden and the National Security Agency’s Office of General Counsel.

The email, provided to the committee by the NSA on April 10, 2014, poses a question about the relative authority of laws and executive orders—it does not register concerns about NSA’s intelligence activities, as was suggested by Snowden in an NBC interview this week.

The NSA informed the committee that it has found no evidence that Snowden “expressed concerns or complaints, in email or any other form, about NSA’s intelligence activities to anyone in a position of authority or oversight” and that it continues to search for any such communications.

The email between Snowden and the NSA is unclassified and contains no information that could jeopardize intelligence activities, sources or methods.

Chairman Feinstein released the following statement regarding the email exchange:

“Last month, the Senate Intelligence Committee asked the NSA for any communications between Snowden and the agency related to the legality of NSA programs. As a result, the committee was provided a copy of the email exchange I am releasing today. The NSA informed the committee that it has located no other relevant communication from Snowden.

“Snowden in June 2013 told the South China Morning Post that he accepted employment as a Booz Allen Hamilton contractor for the NSA in March 2013 because it ‘granted [him] access to lists of machines all over the world the NSA hacked.’ He said, ‘That is why I accepted that position about three months ago.’

“In the months since the first leaks of classified information, the government has declassified and released significant information about NSA programs in an effort to be more transparent with the public, both in the United States and internationally. I believe this transparency is important and should also be applied to the communication that Snowden referenced in his recent interview.”

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