Lindsay Mills

Mills's father Jonathan Mills lives in Laurel, Maryland.[4] She graduated from Laurel High School, studied at the Maryland Institute College of Art, and became a dancer and acrobat.[5]

Mills and Edward Snowden lived together in Baltimore, Japan, and Hawaii.[6] They have been together since at least 2009.[6]

Mills kept a blog in which she posted pictures of herself posing and performing.[7] On May 20, 2013, Snowden left Hawaii for Hong Kong and told her that he was going on a business trip.[8]

On June 6, 2013, agents from the National Security Agency (NSA) searched Mills's home seeking Snowden.[9] On June 9, 2013, The Guardian published a story revealing that Snowden had made the global surveillance disclosures.[9] On June 10, 2013, Mills wrote on her website, "I'll be refraining from blog posts for awhile" then deleted all posts within a day.[10]

Mills was shocked to learn what Snowden had done.[11] On her personal blog, she wrote: "I feel alone, lost, overwhelmed, and desperate for a reprieve".[7]

Mills became the focus of a media sensation after the global surveillance disclosures when she was identified as Snowden's girlfriend.[12] One media outlet called Mills "the girlfriend Edward Snowden left behind".[5] In 2013, BuzzFeed reviewed Mills's personal blog.[5] It noted that she had a boyfriend whom she called "E" and her "man of mystery".[5] Mills blogged about Snowden leaving soon after he left.[13]

After Snowden left Hawaii, reporters sought to question members of the Waikiki Acrobatic Troupe for insight into Mills and Snowden's relationship.[14] Some comments reported from that interview included "I never got to know her", "I wasn't even aware she was in a relationship", and "I have no idea how much pole and other stuff she'd done".[14]

Between June 2013 and 2014, there was no public awareness in the media of any interaction between Mills and Snowden.[15] By January 2014, Mills had not spoken to the media for seven months.[16] Mills's father shared that she was trying to make sense of what had happened and plan for her future.[16]

Later, the Citizenfour documentary included a scene which showed Snowden and Mills reunited in Moscow.[15] This reveal in October 2014 was the first indication in the media that they were still dating.[15] The information that Mills and Snowden were together and happy was surprising because until the documentary, the media had reported that Snowden's life in Russia was a miserable punishment.[2]

Mills and Glenn Greenwald joined director Laura Poitras on stage at the 87th Academy Awards to accept the Academy Award for Citizenfour,[17] Mills took one of the three Oscar statues awarded in the ceremony.[18] Reflecting on the experience of being on stage to receive the statue for Snowden, Mills later commented, "We won a motherfucking Oscar!"[18] In September 2016, one reporter described the Oscar showing as "Mills's most notable public appearance".[19]

In March 2015, Mills revived her blog and made two posts which a writer for Jezebel described as "mysterious".[15]

For Halloween 2015, Mills posted pictures of herself with Snowden in Halloween costumes as Carmen Sandiego and Waldo of Where's Waldo?[20][21] Both popular fictional characters are known for hiding.[20][21] In the photo, Mills and Snowden are posing in front of the J. Edgar Hoover Building but presumably this is photo manipulation because they supposedly remain in Russia.[20][21]

Permanent Record, Snowden's 2019 book, features Mills's writings from her diary as part of the narrative of the surveillance disclosures.[22]

In 2020, it was announced that Mills was pregnant and that she and Snowden intended to apply for Russian citizenship without renouncing their U.S. citizenship.[23] Their son was born in December 2020.[24] In 2020, Russia granted Snowden permanent residency rights, and on September 26, 2022, President Vladimir Putin signed a decree granting him Russian citizenship.[25]

Mills has a history of being highly active in new media publishing, including social media, blogging, and video sharing.[26] Her father described her as artistic, free and open, and the opposite of Edward Snowden.[16]

A reviewer for The New Yorker described Mills's blog as "a mixture of chatty accounts of Mills's days in Hawaii, stories of her athletic and pole-dancing feats, descriptions of fun evenings with friends, and declarations of girl power".[1] A writer for The Daily Telegraph described Mills's blog and social media presence as vivid.[16] Snowden has criticized the media's use of sexy pictures to portray Mills.[27] The character of Lindsay Mills has a prominent place in Snowden, a 2016 dramatization of Snowden's global surveillance disclosure.[28] Director Oliver Stone said that the relationship between Mills and Snowden was an important part of his movie.[29] Actress Shailene Woodley plays Mills in the film.[30] Unable to meet Mills in person before filming,[30] Woodley based her performance on information from Mills's blog and social media posts.[31]

• lsjourney.com, Archived 21 September 2019 at the Wayback Machine