Julian Assange Free
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange agreed Monday to plead guilty to a felony in exchange for release from prison. Having spent approximately 62 months in a British prison awaiting United States extradition, Assange is en route to appear before a U.S. court in Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands, on Wednesday.
According to a knowledgeable official who spoke to the New York Times, Assange will plead guilty to “illegally obtaining and disclosing national security material.” In exchange, he will receive as his “sentencing” prison time corresponding to what he has already served in Britain. He would then be free to travel back to his home country of Australia.
Background: Assange has a long history of cybercrime and hacktivism.
- In 1991, the Australian government charged Assange with 31 counts of cybercrime.
- In 2006, he founded WikiLeaks as a center for what he called “scientific journalism”: exposing classified documents.
- In 2010, WikiLeaks published almost half a million documents. This included much about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from U.S. soldier Bradley Manning.
- Later that year, WikiLeaks started publishing roughly 250,000 U.S. diplomatic cables.
- He held asylum in Ecuador’s embassy in the United Kingdom from 2012 to 2019.
- Since then, he has been in British custody appealing extradition to the U.S.
Going forward: Assange no longer leads WikiLeaks, but he is still very influential in the hacktivist community. His release gives WikiLeaks a major disruptive asset right when the U.S., the UK, France and other countries are heading into pivotal elections.
Assange’s work has exposed a lot of corruption in countries like the U.S. He has also caused a lot of problems. The Trumpet expects America’s current political dysfunction to intensify and for more corruption to be exposed. A freed Julian Assange may play a significant role in that exposure.
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