Wikileaks founder and journalist Julian Assange has been freed from the British prison where he has been held for over five years after striking a plea deal with the Biden Administration.
[RELATED: Julian Assange Wins In U.K. Court, Will Be Allowed to Appeal U.S. Extradition…]
“Julian Assange is free. He left Belmarsh maximum security prison on the morning of 24 June, after having spent 1901 days there,” said Wikileaks on X, “After more than five years in a 2×3 metre cell, isolated 23 hours a day, he will soon reunite with his wife Stella Assange, and their children, who have only known their father from behind bars.”
As part of his deal with President Biden’s Department of Justice (DOJ), Assange agreed to plead guilty to a single felony charge related to his publication of classified U.S. military material during the Iraq war.
Assange will deliver his plea at a U.S. district court in the Northern Mariana Islands on Wednesday due to his reluctance to travel to the mainland U.S.
As part of the deal, Assange will be sentenced to 62 months in prison, the duration of his time in British prison, but his time in the U.K. will count towards his sentence, meaning that he will not have to serve any additional time, and will be free to return to his home country of Australia.
Without the plea, Assange would have faced up to 175 years in prison following alleged violations of the Espionage Act.
For years, Assange has been held in prison in the U.K., as he has continually attempted to appeal his extradition order to the U.S. in a lengthy succession of hearings.
Recently, bipartisan calls have grown for the Biden Administration to pardon Assange, with supporters claiming that a conviction of Assange would constitute an attack on First Amendment rights.
[RELATED: Calls Grow for the Pardon of Julian Assange Before a Potential Extradition to the U.S…]
In February, a group of over 35 law professors penned a letter to the DOJ calling for Assange’s release.
The professors argued that, because journalists cannot be prosecuted for publishing classified material, journalists should not be held liable for publishing information that was obtained illegally.
They argued that the precedent set by Assange’s prosecution could set a dangerous precedent for DOJ prosecutions of journalists.
The case against Assange alleged that he did act illegally in encouraging former army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to hand over classified material detailing U.S. war crimes in Iraq.
Although Assange has not been given a presidential pardon, which his supporters have been calling for since the Obama Administration, people from both sides of the political spectrum were nevertheless quick to celebrate his newfound freedom.
“I just heard Julian Assange will soon be free due to a deal. His liberation is great news, but it’s a travesty that he’s already spent so much time in jail. Obama, Trump, & Biden should have never pursued this prosecution,” said Rep. Thomas Massie (R-K.Y.) on X.
Robert Kennedy Jr., a liberal independent candidate running for president, also voiced his support for Assange.
“Julian Assange struck a plea deal and will go free! I am overjoyed. He’s a generational hero. The bad news is that he had to plea guilty to conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense info. Which means the US security state succeeded in criminalizing journalism and extending their jurisdiction globally to non-citizens,” said Kennedy.
Not all political figures were happy with the news; Former Vice President Mike Pence criticized the plea deal, claiming that Assange endangered U.S. military personnel by revealing war crimes, but failed to condemn the war crimes themselves.
“Julian Assange endangered the lives of our troops in a time of war and should have been prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The Biden administration’s plea deal with Assange is a miscarriage of justice and dishonors the service and sacrifice of the men and women of our Armed Forces and their families,” said Pence on X.
Assange’s release has led to renewed calls for the release of Edward Snowden, a man who revealed the government’s mass surveillance of private citizens, and who has been living in exile in Russia since then.
