They both live outside of US now and have mentioned their reasons countless times. Laura Poitras explained why she's staying in Germany and how she does not take any materials with her during her trips to US, for example, at the last CCC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmKqdMDastM
They might not have feared for their lives, but they obviously are afraid to have any information on them when crossing the borders and they are simply afraid to do their job as a journalists in US.
"Crossing the borders" being the operative phrase there. You have fewer rights at border crossings than living your life within the confines of the border, unfortunately. This says nothing about the quality of US media (whatever the state of said quality is).
>You have fewer rights at border crossings than living your life within the confines of the border, unfortunately.
Now you'll say that location of Guantanamo Bay prison outside of US jurisdiction is an 'unfortunate accident' as well. Both seem quite purposeful decisions to me.
And yes, the fact that two probably most important journalists of modern times have both chosen to go into exile just to do their job, even though both love their country, - I think this actually says quite a bit about the freedom of press in the said country.
Others have already mentioned that they don't carry their work into the US, but they, themselves, still travel to the US. This is hardly the "exile" that you want it to be (to prove your point).
