The U.S. Congress and Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, have what can only be regarded as a testy relationship. Its various members have advocated and condoned his farcical prosecution, demanded his lifelong incarceration, even assassination, taking issue with his appetite for publishing unsavoury, classified details about the U.S. imperium.
…In January 2021, former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard from Hawaii urged Trump, in his last days, to “pardon Julian Assange as one of his final acts before leaving the White House. The prosecution against the Australian was “a direct threat to a free press & freedom of speech for every American.” In her response to Assange’s eviction from the Ecuadorian embassy and subsequent arrest, Gabbard had this to say: “I think what is happening here is…some form of retaliation coming from the government, saying, ‘Hey, this is what happens when you release information that we don’t want you to release.’”
…The latest move by Democrat Rep. Rashida Tlaib from Michigan promises to be something more. Tlaib has urged that fellow members put aside their differences and append their signatures to a letter to Attorney-General Merrick Garland urging him to drop the charges. “I know that many of us have very strong feelings about Mr. Assange, but what we think of him and his actions is really beside the point here.” The instrument being used in prosecuting Assange was “the notoriously undemocratic Espionage Act,” one that “seriously undermines freedom of the press and the First Amendment.”
R&I – TxPAT
Free Assange
Article URL : https://intpolicydigest.org/turning-tides-the-u-s-congress-and-julian-assange/