The reality many citizens face today is strikingly similar to what WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange cautioned about long before it became mainstream. His brother, Gabriel Shipton, recently joined BlazeTV host Nicole Shanahan to discuss how the United States has drifted into a near-total surveillance environment.
“We’re at a breaking point,” Shanahan told Shipton. “It’s no longer hidden. The government is openly signaling that it’s willing to strip away civil liberties and constitutional protections. Julian is watching all of this unfold. What does he make of it?”
According to Shipton, Assange saw these developments coming more than a decade ago.
“He wrote about this long before the Snowden disclosures,” Shipton said. “People suspected widespread surveillance existed, but there was no hard proof until those leaks. Julian was already warning that a system like this was being built.”
Shipton noted that Assange often spoke about the idea that we might be the last generation to experience true freedom, predicting that subtle, invisible forms of control would eventually become normal.
He also raised concerns about the latest FISA legislation and the accelerating integration of AI tools into monitoring and data-collection systems. Shanahan agreed, adding that this is no longer theoretical.
“Government agencies are already using AI for censorship and surveillance,” she said. “After the pandemic, they’re not even pretending to hide it.”
Shanahan argued that while people are becoming more aware of what’s happening, public backlash is being contained.
“It feels like anyone who tries to warn others about what’s at stake is being pushed aside or silenced,” she said.
Despite the bleak outlook Assange once described, Shipton said there are still reasons for optimism.
“Julian is encouraged by the rise of independent media,” he explained. “He follows as much as he can from inside his situation. You can draw a straight line from the early WikiLeaks publications to today’s explosion of independent journalism and the public’s growing mistrust of corporate media.”
According to Shipton, WikiLeaks helped expose how traditional media often operates, which opened the door for a new wave of reporters willing to challenge established narratives.
“They revealed what the corporate press actually is,” he said. “And that impact is still being felt today.”