Donald Trump Says He Is Close to Pardoning Julian Assange or Edward Snowden

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Donald Trump said he considered pardoning Julian Assange or Edward Snowden during his time as president but ultimately decided not to.

In an interview with Candace Owens for The Daily Wire, the former president said he felt “somewhat stronger” about a case, but did not specify whether it involved the founder of Wikileaks or the whistleblower of the National Security Agency ( NSA). .

Assange faces extradition to the U.S. to face espionage charges for leaking thousands of classified documents in 2010 and 2011. Snowden has been deported to Russia since he revealed the NSA surveillance techniques used against U.S. citizens on a mass scale in 2013.

When Owens asked if he was considering pardoning Assange or Snowden for exposing “corruption,” Trump replied: “You have two sides to it: In one case, you had kind of a spy deal going on, and then another case, you have someone exposing real corruption.

“I won’t say which one, but I feel a little stronger about one than the other …. but I could have done it.

“I would say you have people on both sides of that issue. Good people on both sides, and you have some bad people on one side. But I decided to let one ride, let the courts fix it. And on I think that’s what the courts really do.

Trump added: “You know, you have a country and it’s some spying and doing some bad stuff that’s been released that really brings us back and really hurt us with what they did. But […] I can go, I will soon go another way. “

Trump appears to be referring to the British High Court’s recent decision to allow Assange to be extradited from the UK to the US as part of a long-running legal dispute.

On December 10, the High Court in London ruled that Assange could be extradited to the US to face espionage charges.

The US government will have to provide assurances that Assange will not be held in very strict prison conditions if extradited.

In a statement to Newsweek, Assange’s lawyer Barry Pollack described the decision from the court based on “vague assurances” from the U.S. government as “disturbing.”

“The UK court reached this decision without considering whether extradition was appropriate when the United States was pursuing cases against him that could result in decades in prison, based on his reporting of factual information about issues worthy of news such as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, ”Pollack added.

During his time as president, Trump issued 237 acts of clemency — 143 pardons and 94 commutations — some of which were to key allies and supporters.

Donald Trump (C) said he was considering pardoning Julian Assange (L) or Edward Snowden (R) during his time as president. Jack Taylor/ Zach Gibson – Pool/ Barton Gellman/ Getty Images

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