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“WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has pleaded guilty to a single felony charge for publishing U.S. military secrets in a deal with Justice Department prosecutors that secures his freedom and concludes a drawn-out legal saga… Though the deal with prosecutors required him to admit guilt to a single felony count, it would also permit him to return to his native Australia without spending any time in an American prison. He had been jailed in the United Kingdom for the last five years, fighting extradition to the United States…
“The guilty plea resolves a criminal case brought by the Trump administration Justice Department in connection with the receipt and publication of war logs and diplomatic cables that detailed U.S. military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Prosecutors alleged that he conspired with former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to obtain the records and published them without regard to American national security, including by releasing the names of human sources who provided information to U.S. forces.” AP News
The left is critical of the deal, arguing that Assange should not have been charged with espionage.
“I am not a fan of Assange, who, even if he is not a Russian asset, has certainly behaved like one for more than a decade. Some of his leaks have almost certainly resulted in the deaths of American agents and allies; others have disclosed CIA hacking techniques for the benefit of U.S. adversaries; a slew of Hillary Clinton’s emails—which he peddled as a middleman between Russian hackers and eager Western reporters during the 2016 presidential campaign—may have helped catapult Donald Trump to the White House…
“But none of these deeds were what prompted the U.S. Justice Department to hit Assange with a 19-count indictment… Assange is not, by most standards, a journalist. But what he did in this case was nothing different from what many journalists do routinely.”
Fred Kaplan, Slate
“The charges of distributing classified information were problematic because Assange was plainly not a spy. He was in the business of gathering classified documents and then publishing them widely. This is the same thing that journalists do routinely. Conversely, cracking a password and then giving it to a source is not something journalists do routinely. That part of the indictment was relatively uncontroversial… But it wasn't part of the single count that Assange agreed to plead guilty to…
“The plea deal very explicitly avoids the hacking offense and charges only that Assange violated the Espionage Act by receiving and distributing classified documents. This is precisely the precedent that journalists objected to. A plea deal doesn't officially set a precedent, but in effect the Department of Justice is making it clear that it can and will prosecute someone who does nothing more than publish classified information.”
Kevin Drum, Jabberwocking
“Using espionage charges was always a bad and cynical move. The case relates to hundreds of thousands of leaked documents about the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, as well as diplomatic cables, which were made public by WikiLeaks working with the Guardian and other media organisations. They revealed appalling abuses by the US and other governments, which would not otherwise have been exposed – and for which no one has been held liable, despite the pursuit of Mr Assange…
“Alarmingly, the Espionage Act allows no public interest defence, preventing defendants from discussing the material leaked, why they shared it, and why they believe the public should know about it. The Obama administration correctly identified the chilling effect that spying charges could have on investigative journalism, and chose not to bring them on that basis. The Biden administration – which proclaims itself a champion of press freedom globally – should not have pursued them.”
Editorial Board, The Guardian
The right is generally critical of the deal, arguing that Assange deserves to be punished for his crimes.
The right is generally critical of the deal, arguing that Assange deserves to be punished for his crimes.
“WikiLeaks released a cache of illegally obtained classified documents revealing American methods, assets, and allies in the Afghan and Iraqi theaters where U.S. service personnel were actively engaged in counterinsurgency operations. His work outed the Afghans who worked directly with American servicemen, opening them up to retribution. And they most certainly did face retribution…
“Assange’s ‘crime’ was not limited only to the publication of documents that explicitly imperiled U.S. interests and provided insurgent organizations with actionable intelligence on military bases, prisons, and the movement of U.S. troops and local security forces. It was to facilitate the pilfering of those documents in the first place… This is quite simply beyond the remit of any journalist. It’s more akin to the conduct we would expect from a hostile intelligence network.”
Noah Rothman, National Review
“WikiLeaks ‘very likely knew it was assisting a Russian intelligence influence effort [in 2016],’ said a 2020 report by the Senate Intelligence Committee. Its investigation found ‘significant indications that Julian Assange and WikiLeaks have benefited from Russian government support.’ Mr. Assange denied that Russia was the source of the Democratic emails, but it’s hard to see why anyone should believe him…
“None of this is the behavior of a journalist or a whistleblower, and Mr. Assange is neither. This would have been obvious during the Cold War, say, if a foreign national had been caught copying and disseminating hundreds of thousands of U.S. military field reports. The internet age makes leaking easier, but it hasn’t blurred these lines anywhere near enough to cover Mr. Assange. If the U.S. had failed to pursue him, it might as well have given up keeping secrets.”
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal
Some argue, “It was Manning, not Assange, who stole these classified materials and leaked them to a media organization in violation of federal law. Indeed, Manning was convicted on multiple charges of espionage and theft of classified materials, and sentenced to 35 years in prison. But charging Assange with espionage for publishing illegally leaked materials sets a horrible precedent for free speech and journalism…
“Put simply, what Assange did is no different than what The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, and many other corporate media outlets do every day: they publish and report on classified material that was stolen or obtained illegally by sources. The main difference between Assange and these outlets is that Assange did what he did in order to hold power to account, whereas the corporate press does it in service of power — at least when a Democratic administration is in the White House.”
John Daniel Davidson, The Federalist
