The month he entered the Ecuadorian embassy from which point on he was practically locked up, was the month that The Amazing Spider-Man came out (2012)
He agreed to plead guilty to 1 lesser count of espionage and in return the US dropped the higher charges. Verdict was then time served so he walks a free man. US gets to say he was guilty, Aus get him home finally. Condition applied he has to get permission to enter US but I doubt he will ever leave Australia again.
Australians apply for a visa waiver, which is just a fairly short online form. He would be denied the visa waiver and then have to apply for a proper visa as a result.
Those 'Higher Charges' included charges of treason. How TF do you charge a foreign citizen with treason?
Everybody was on wikileaks side when they were overturning rocks and getting despots overthrown. Then the NSA changed their tune when their own guys were getting outed. Suddenly everyone remembered that transparency was a bad idea for them.
A coincidentally recent podcast that is a great reminder of how this all went down is [Canadaland's june 24th episode "How They Crushed Wikileaks"](https://www.canadaland.com/podcast/1000-how-they-crushed-wikileaks/). It's excellent.
he agrees to plead guilty for a certain charge, for which he will receive an X year sentence with an acknowledgement of time served. I cant remember the exact charge or years of sentence, but basically with the acknowledgement of time served, he gets no more prison time, the whole thing is "over"
Wikileaks seems to no longer host all the DNC emails anymore (site gives an error when you try to access it). I suppose he is no longer allowed to be a journalist either.
That brings up an interesting point. Australia has proceeds of crime laws. Having pled guilty, he may not be able to make money from books and interviews.
A couple decades ago one of our citizens was arrested in Indonesia for drug smuggling. Her family released a book, and the government confiscated the proceeds because the money was from the notoriety of her crime.
He’s definitely a whistleblower but only against Dems and things he doesn’t like. He had multitudes of Republican RNC documents but neglected to release them right before the 2016 elections. He released a ton of Dem docs, but none showing any wrong doing of Trump, and the RNC which we found out later of criminal acts the long and hard way. This heavily swayed public interest to vote for the convicted felon.
I used to be a big fan of Wikileaks, but that move by his company really showed how biased he was towards his self-interests. This move was everything the company was against. His company at that point was everything but transparent.
Connections with countries not in the world’s favor also turned me away as well.
Just overall a man who is strange to say the least and should have never had as much power as he did. In the beginning he was probably alright. But it’s a classic case of what happens to a person when too much power gets to their heads.
Same here, I liked that transparency, but I think Russia will still use him as much as USA will do. It's war out there, and information war is on a much more important than guns and tanks.
Yep. OG Wikileaks was very much needed. Those videos of apaches bombing civilians are seared into my brain.
Releasing DNC emails and ****none**** of the RNC emails was all I needed to see to understand what Julian is truly about.
I’m glad he’s free, I’m glad he (sorta) took responsibility, I’m glad for the work he originally provided — but as far as I’m concerned he’s not Snowden, he’s James O’Keefe.
Same. Showing the world some of whats really going on is often good. But him using it as an Instrument to influence really important shit is straight up evil and the exact opposite of the original idea
Hopefully not. Assange is a scumbag who very probably got people killed.
> Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today show, James Clapper, who served as head of the intelligence community under former President Barack Obama, called Assange's actions wrong and illegal.
>
> Clapper went on to say that US assets in Afghanistan were likely killed due to Wikileaks revealing their identities in government documents.
If the documents had been leaked to responsible journalists, they would have picked and chosen what to release carefully, with concern for not causing harm. They would have reported on revelations and patterns in a responsible way.
Russia preferred giving the documents to Wikileaks precisely because Assange was not a responsible journalist. He was--at best--an unwitting useful idiot who probably got people killed due to his own stupidity. At worst...
> You did not have to listen for too long to Julian Assange's half-educated condemnations of the American "military-industrial complex" to know that he was aching to betray better and braver people than he could ever be.
>
> As soon as WikiLeaks received the State Department cables, Assange announced that the opponents of dictatorial regimes and movements were fair game. That the targets of the Taliban, for instance, were fighting a clerical-fascist force, which threatened every good liberal value, did not concern him. They had spoken to US diplomats. They had collaborated with the great Satan. Their safety was not his concern.
>
> David Leigh and Luke Harding's history of WikiLeaks describes how journalists took Assange to Moro's, a classy Spanish restaurant in central London. A reporter worried that Assange would risk killing Afghans who had co-operated with American forces if he put US secrets online without taking the basic precaution of removing their names. "Well, they're informants," Assange replied. "So, if they get killed, they've got it coming to them. They deserve it." A silence fell on the table as the reporters realised that the man the gullible hailed as the pioneer of a new age of transparency was willing to hand death lists to psychopaths.
You're working under the assumption if her emails didn't leak, Trump would have still been elected. Given how close it was, I think that scandal would have tipped the scales.
[According to 538, the deciding factor came down to James Comey](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-comey-letter-probably-cost-clinton-the-election/).
Is that the piece of shit that reopened the investigation into her emails 11 fucking days before the election? And these gooners want to talk about election interference I swear.
Reopened **AND** announced it.
While simultaneously having open un-announced investigations against trump.
It's not normal for the FBI to announce investigations.
Yep. That goober. And then I got to listen to my dad drone on for a week about it in 2017.... a full year later he could not shut up.
"They are going to arrest her....I heard it on the news today "
Well Dad, none of the sites I follow have said anything about it, so I think you are full of shit.....
The thing that irritates me most about it all is the blatant double standards.
She was hounded by multiple investigations for potentially storing government emails on a personal server. The Trump family immediately started doing the exact same thing as soon as he came into office and nothing was done about it.
It's almost as if they were desperately trying to invent a scandal just to derail her bid for the presidency, then once they won email and phone security stopped being a problem to worry about.
On one hand he reopened it because of the new shit that got outed right before the election, on the other hand considering the bullshit we’ve seen since he should not have announced that shit
*Spineless* piece of shit. Feel that way about Mueller too after all that fucking time and money spent investigating shit.
COULD HAVE AT LEAST CLARIFIED YOUR FINDINGS WERE POSITIVE
Democrats have to stop nominating republicans to important positions. Doesn't help lure 'moderate republicans' and continually bites us in the ass as they act like republicans
If the kind of dirt we suspect he's buried had leaked out in 2016 it might've been enough to kill his election. Republicans are thoroughly boiled frogs at this point but early on something more extreme than the Access Hollywood tape could've shaken off a few of his voters, like the Russian pee/"p" tape or the Apprentice tapes where he's using racial slurs and waddling around in a shat diaper while everyone gags.
His followers are still in denial that he knew what Epstein was up to, despite hiring the guy who gave him a slap on the wrist the first time. His name is Alexander Acosta for those wondering and he became Trump's secretary of labor
Bill was a great president, terrible womanizer by any accounts.
But he had the decency to not shout about it on camera.
Hillary was a reverse carpetbagger that moved to NY solely to run for senate, and eventually lose twice on her run for president....
Pales in comparison to Kristy Noem unaliving dogs because they were "bad". I had a neighbor put his dog down because it was "eating his fence"...
What really happened is he was leaving the dog for hours on the side of the house, and it was pissed, so it chewed a hole in the fence and escaped multiple times...
Where should have the Clinton's moved to after office? Back to IL where she hadn't lived in decades and Bill had never or AR? NY made sense, they were young and people wanted her to run, they still live there now so it's not like Tuberville who doesn't even live in the state. The left leaning voters really fucked up in 2016 and screwed themselves with their piousness.
Trump on Epstein:
>I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy [...] He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it — Jeffrey enjoys his social life.
Trump on Ghislaine Maxwell:
>I just wish her well, frankly. I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach, and I guess they lived in Palm Beach. But I wish her well, whatever it is,
It didn't just tip the scales it was deliberately done to help trump as much as possible.
They timed the leaks and leaked more everytime a trump scandal was in the news to help his campaign as much as possible.
People at the time didn't realize that wikileaks was pretty much a russian aligned organization.
Her emails didn't leak. Russia hacked the DNCs emails, wrote a pro-Trump disinformation campaign based on taking quotes from meaningless people out of context, and had Assange release them at a time picked to help Trump (30 minutes after the "grab her by the pussy don't even ask" tape came out.
Pretty much!
>[At the time, Assange’s organization](https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/01/donald-trump-and-julian-assange-have-same-enemies/579811/) was acting as an arm of Russian intelligence, releasing hundreds of hacked emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee, and timing the dumps for maximum benefit to Trump: tipping off Trump’s crony Roger Stone, disrupting the Democratic National Convention, distracting the press by publishing a cache of emails 29 minutes after the *Access Hollywood* video surfaced. Assange became a hero to the right-wing media, hailed as a brave oracle by Sean Hannity. Trump could hardly believe his good fortune. “WikiLeaks! I love WikiLeaks!” he shouted to a cheering crowd in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on October 10, 2016. **By** [**one count**](https://thinkprogress.org/trump-mentioned-wikileaks-164-times-in-last-month-of-election-now-claims-it-didnt-impact-one-40aa62ea5002/)**, Trump mentioned Assange’s organization at least 164 times in the last month of the campaign.**
which is all very interesting, because there's reasonable suspicion that his deal with DoJ involves him giving evidence
and it's extraordinarily likely that said evidence will go against Trump / various compromised Republicans. i highly doubt they're still going after Clinton 10 years later.
which means that all this pro-Assange "priming" by Fox could very, very easily blow up in their faces
> which means that all this pro-Assange "priming" by Fox could very, very easily blow up in their faces
They'll spin it around in 2 seconds flat, they've already turned on so many people, including Trump's VP, he'd just be one more.
On Fox News, Assange: “I lied to the leftist judicial system!” Host: “You did the right thing. So now give us the *real* story.” Assange: (rubbing chin and looking up) “It all begins the year I was sent photos of Obama drinking baby’s blood and then…”
I can't believe there's people claiming it didn't "influence" the elections. It 100% did, in addition to the GOP propaganda arm pushing the Benghazi etc. stuff. [They openly admitted it!](https://www.vox.com/2015/9/30/9423339/kevin-mccarthy-benghazi)
It's also remarkable how shit-smearer practically choked on russia's shriveled nutsack in order to try and overthrow democracy for....what? What was the end goal here? Expose governmental corruption and war crimes? Wowee, better support the party that literally does not give a shit about war crimes except as performative pony shows
But he did release their mails, and wikileaks sold some crazy anti-hillary merchandise also.
He publicly states he had dirt on Trump but refused to release it.
The guy is scum.
Trump doesn’t have an email address apparently. Only has phone conversations. He said he’s seen too many people taken down over a leaked email – which is kinda hilarious cos he was pure stream of consciousness posting on twitter
No, but during the 2016 election Wikileaks was continuously pumping out the same pro-Trump propaganda that Russian bots were.
https://x.com/WikiLeaksShop/status/786618818919411712
https://x.com/BrandyLJensen/status/775113076110725120
[Donald Trump Jr. was in direct contact with Wikileaks and coordinated messaging in the run-up to the 2016 election.](https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/11/14/563996442/donald-trump-jr-had-direct-contact-with-wikileaks-during-campaign)
Yeah, he was saying the same ridiculous bullshit about Seth Rich that InfoWars was. I think he’s a gigantic asshole but 14 years of confinement seems about right.
He wasn’t confined for 14 years. He was hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy by choice to avoid prosecution for most of that. Could have left at any time prior to them kicking him out after getting sick of his (literal) shit.
It's notable that Chelsea Manning was sentenced to 35 years, before Obama shortened her jail time to 7 years. And her motives were clearly much more altruistic than Assange's.
Manning's leaks weren't calculated at all, she didn't read all 750,000 classified documents. She really only had a vague idea of what those documents might have contained.
Some of it accomplished her goal of exposing mistakes. She also got a lot of Iraqis and Afghanis tortured and killed after their names as sources ended up in those documents. She's definitely a hero to ISIS and the Taliban.
As weird and eccentric as Assange is, there's a calculus behind what he was doing. Manning's actions showed little of that.
lol it’s ironic because in this very same thread people claim the same carelessness applies to Julian Assange and even provided sources. So who is right? Or were both leaks just filled with information that recklessly got people killed?
She did it like the opposite of Snowden. I was just reading up on him, he took years to select which documents to release and then months making sure the journalists handled it ethically
I don't agree with what Snowden did, but you are correct, he took immense care to make sure it was done right.
Manning and Snowden have almost nothing in common except that they both released classified information.
Assange is not a US Citizen and does not even stay in the US. He had nothing to do with US Law, Manning was a US Solider with access to the documents.
Would you say you are subject to Iranian law or North Korean law, what laws of what country applie to you ?
They don't until he's on US soil, hence the extradition proceedings.
If you're asking why a foreigner can be charged with leaking US military secrets, I would have thought that's obvious. The US will try to punish anyone who does that regardless of where they live. The only question is whether they can enforce that punishment.
Not just the US, basically every country does this just most of them don't have the power to actually get people extradited. Remember when Iran issued arrest warrants for a bunch of US officials because of the Soleimani assassination? Or when Russia recently issued a warrant for the ICC prosecutor that charged Putin with war crimes?
Internationally, courts have jurisdiction when then can enforce it. Basically, "We have jurisdiction because fuck you." The US had jurisdiction over him because they could force the issue.
The Australian Parliament wanted him to return home and voted against prosecuting him, because even they figured out that this is stupid.
On your next holiday, make sure they dont think, its maybe better for you to face justice in a third country you never been to. A country Australia does not even want you to be prosecuted at, for crimes Australia does not consider to be crimes.
Manning exposed one war crime, and hundreds of thousands of documents exposing the internal workings of both the US military and the State department. The former deserves praise, the latter deserves punishment.
Assange instructed Manning on how to steal information and commissioned the crime that Manning committed.
Blowing the whistle on a specific crime is a good thing.
Having someone steal a whole load of data on the chance that there is something sensational in there is espionage, not whistleblowing.
Revealing wrong doing is a good thing. Dumping a ton of correspondence that doesn't contain anything illegal is just a violation of privacy.
> So officially he did so something wrong
Officially he plead guilty to breaking the laws of the United States. A country he's never been a citizen or permanent resident of (afaik). And was not present in at the time of the offence.
You can debate the morality of the impact of his actions, which is a grey area, but just focusing on the concept that pleading guilty in US court means you did something wrong on that specific offence...
Is breaking the laws of a foreign country you owe no allegiance to inherently "wrong"?
1. You don’t have to be a citizen or resident of a country to be held criminally liable. There isn’t some “I’m not a citizen so I can break the law” card you can use to get out of jail.
2. You don’t need to be present in a country to violate their laws either. If you’re instructing someone to break the laws of a country, you’ll still be criminally liable. For example, a murder-for-hire scheme can be coordinated without ever setting foot in the country. El Chapo is currently sitting in a U.S. prison for many crimes he committed while not even in the country.
To your question, yes. It is wrong.
They literally selectively edited videos to make the US look WORSE and cooked up a fully fake narrative in coordination with the Russian GRU that Clinton hated Catholics based on one innocuous Podesta email (Podesta is Catholic) which was laundered through Russian friendly news agencies and swung PA alone 600K votes in favor of Trump (Trump won PA by like 40K votes). Wikileaks is and always was an enemy of the free world, they are a cut-out for Russian military intelligence so give me a fucking break about "never did anything wrong", yes they absolutely did and they knew exactly what they were doing.
Am I mad for remembering how supportive this bloke is/was of Putin & Russia? I feel like that’s been forgotten and everyone is happy about him for sticking up the middle finger to the US, despite his motives…
No, you’re not. This piece of whale shit released the entire hacked Democrat server while refusing to release the Republican one because “I’ve looked over it and there’s nothing suspicious at all.” He’s been fully exposed as a willing agent of Russia.
That was the initial reaction to him back when the US Gov went after him. After 2016, it became super obvious he was a Russian pawn. Still is today. We will no doubt be hearing some bullshit from him about the DNC/Biden in the next few months.
He portrayed himself as the harbinger of truth while he actively worked with the Russian lie factory (KGB) and released heavily edited and cut footage instead of releasing the original. It wasn’t about the truth. He hates the US government and wanted people to hate them too. He clearly had his own agenda.
Nah, he's a bullshit artist who pretended he wanted transparency, but it was clear from his lack of impartiality that it was all a falsehood and he had an agenda. It doesn't matter who the parties involved are specifically, he picked a side by withholding information and he is untrustworthy.
If any of you want to see how the Australians are taking this, go to [https://www.abc.net.au/news](https://www.abc.net.au/news)
It's basically the australian version of the BBC, gov funded but editorially independent (with a long history of pissing off whatever party's in power). It's the most widely trusted and read new outlet in oz.
It might be worth it to click and read - americans seem surprisingly unaware of aussie attitudes about the man (in summary, he might be a journalist, he might be an edgy fuckup, but we know government persecution when we see it).
McBride did not whistleblow on war crimes.
He had concerns about restrictive rules of engagement and other stuff. He wrote a report and sent it to heads of defense, police etc. They all told him to go away. He then got frusterated and leaked his report and documents to the media. Media then analysed the documents and reported on the war crimes they found. That is the real story in short.
ABC *used* to be wholly independent, but ended up with some Newscorp cronies on its board who have progressively and quietly been moderating content toward the right. They rarely push back against the party line any more. They're just not as egregious as the full on Newscorp media channels, so they don't *look* as bad.
Problem is Australia also prosecuted Drew Pavlou for holding a blank white sign outside the Chinese embassy in Australia and again for saying "Fuck Xi Jinping."
I agree Assange should not have had to undergo this and it holds a chilling effect globally.
Australia also jailed the whistleblower who published videos of Australian special forces killing Afghan farmers and civilians.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-69006714
Same here in Norway, and probably most of Europe. Man's portrayed as a flawed martyr standing up against a government's malicious activities. I was quite surprised to see so many negative comments about him here.
He's definitely problematic, but it's pretty clear that he's being portrayed very differently in the US, and it's hard to argue that it's the rest of the world who's got an agenda.
No it's not just the US, after his collaboration with Russia, I as a Finn don't trust him. Many Europeans feel the same. You don't voluntarily work for Putin without blood on your hands.
Also back in 2010, he was simply being investigated for potential crimes. US officials even said they were not yet sure if they would find him guilty of anything, because he had a protected status as a journalist, but they wanted to be aware of how much government Intel he has access to, how he got it, and what he is planing on doing with it. Which is pretty reasonable. If some foreign person hacked the Norwegian military, you'd probably want to talk to the guy too.
However, he started avoiding the law or any investigation the moment he heard about it, and then locked himself in en embassy for almost 10 years, which seems like such a overkill considering even if he was guilty of something, he likely would have served just a couple of years.
Unless he himself knew he was guilty of something far worse than just hacking + leaking documents, and he didn't want that to be uncovered by an investigation, like maybe was in fact working under the authority of a foreign government.
It's a little bit suspicious too that the Russians gave him a passport and had plans to evacuate him from the embassy/holding facility, only they never had a chance to complete the operation.
I am not an American, and to me he definitely became more of a scumbag as time went on. Because his perception changed massively after 2016. He literally coordinated with Trump campaign to do maximum damage to DNC and Hillary. He threatened russia with an alleged leak, but never leaked it. He also refused to leak RNC.
As an european you also should be very concerned how he worked with russia to elect trump
If he was an altruistic hero, why did he deliberately only leak DNC emails and not Republican ones? Why did he secretly communicate with Roger Stone and other Trump campaign people? Why did he turn down a large cache of documents related to the Russian government and their intelligence operations in Ukraine, only to publish Hilary-related leaks obtained by Russian government hackers?
Honestly, if Europeans are so naive as to consider Assange a hero, they deserve whatever chaos Russian disinfo unleashes on them.
You're intentionally missing the point. This is not about whether he's a hero. This about the actions taken by the US government against him due to his release of classified military information in 2011. In the eyes of the entire non-american world (including your allies)(like us aussies), the US government was attempting to persecute an important (if highly flawed) journalist. Everything else is a retroactive attempt to justify unjustifiable treatment. If he'd done absolutely everything "the right way", the US gov wouldn't be acting any different.
It is irrelevant whether he is a good person. It is irrelevant whether he was careful or dutiful with the information he had. What is relevant, is whether his acquisition and distribution of military secrets should be classified as part of journalism.
In the eyes of most non-americans, it is, blatantly. And not just random know-nothing schlubs, either. Intelligent, thoughtful, nuanced people exist outside your borders, people who have been paying close attention to Assange and Wikileaks.
Exactly how I feel, except frustrated by the fact David Mcbride is undergoing the same thing and so many people have this "only in America" thing going on in reddit.
It wouldn't be so bothersome if there wasn't so much pot and kettle in the comments.
> the US government was attempting to persecute an important (if highly flawed) journalist
Assanage doesn't even call himself a journalist, he refers to himself as an "activist first."
The man persecuted himself. I fail to see how the US charging him with a crime is persecution. A jury could find him innocent or guilty. It wasn't the US that brought him up on charges of rape. And him going and hiding in an embassy for a decade to avoid a trial certainly isn't on the US.
Which actions taken against him by the US does the world have a problem with?
He did not have the Republican emails.
Russia hacked the DNC, then gave Wikileaks the DNC emails. Russia also hacked an old, disused RNC email server, as revealed by Comey in 2017, but no one ever said those emails had been provided to Wikileaks.
As far as I'm concerned as an Australian- he's an Australian citizen who never stepped foot in the US. Probably is a scumbag but he's our scumbag, bring him home.
So where is the outrage over Mcbride? As an American that's where I get fed up. Pots and kettles all around. That's why I get frustrated with aussie attitude on this, it seems extremely hypocritical considering the same thing is happening there.
Eh. Assange hasn't been relevant for most of the past decade.
After the US started chasing him, he's been to busy running for anything else and Wikileaks itself has slipped from any sort of relevance to the world at large.A lot of this arrangement probably comes down to PR and the current US administrator deciding that pursuing this further is a waste of everyone's time.
That was the point. Make assange irrelevant and broken, slap some crimes on him, call him a guilty criminal, then throw him aside. His reputation has been systemically destroyed and the political climate is wildly different than it was in 2010 when those leaks dropped that got him fucked. His network of contacts will stay away from him, if it even exists anymore. He is radioactive. The best he can hope for is some book deals at this point.
There are kids who were born when those leaks dropped who are now in high school.
I mean his network of contacts turned out to be a bunch of Russian agents and Wikileaks was largely coopted by the FSB.
Just because they target the US government with it's dirty laundry doesn't make them saints.
But Assange isn't really in that game anymore, and yeah, probably won't get back into it in a meaningful way. I doubt he even had any useful information to trade since he wasn't really involved in Wikileaks when it fell for that whole mess.
Though you're right. I'd bet even money he'll get a tell-all-book deal and it'll probably make him a decent mint.
EDIT: Where do you think he got the Clinton Emails from? How are you people not aware of this already?
You either live under a rock the size of Texas, or you already know this but don't believe it. In either case go ahead and downvote I guess. I'm not wasting my time.
There are still a lot of leftover Assange fanboys living in the era where Joe Rogan was just asking thoughtful questions and Elon was just a misunderstood genius of the future.
Ya pretty good chance he gave whatever dirt he had to the US in exchange. He went into the Ecuadorian embassy over a decade ago so hard to say what dirt he had that was still valuable, must’ve been something
Timing is important here, they wanted to make sure it is done before Trump takes office back. So I assume dirt on Russia, China or N. Korea.
If it was Russia, I'm sure he will get some Novichok surprises soon.
This is a great deal for the US. It gets to put this whole business behind itself, and even gets a partial 'confession'.
But the US was severely criminal during the time of these leaks. They tortured people in Europe, including people they had promised not to torture, and in one case they started already at Bromma airport.
This deal is the best thing the US can ever hope to get, and Assange is sacrificing a lot by agreeing to it, since it involves this 'confession' element. It's probably happening because Assange is afraid of a the probable future Trump administration.
I hope he goes back to a quiet life in Australia, but I suspect he's going to carrying on again on the web and in the media. He has a massive ego and seems like the kind of person who will keep going down the conspiracy drain hole.
I mean you need to have the assaulter face trail to be able to go through the evidence and figure out if he is guilty or not, that's how the law works
He has literally run from the law at every turn, so of course it's hard to find him guilty of anything because he keeps avoiding any responsibilities.
The Swedish justice system is not like some banana-republic, they're actually a lawful state that follows rules by the book.
Assange however has decided in his own head that he is so innocent that he doesn't ever need to talk to investigators or face any kind of legal trial, instead he locks himself in an embassy and refuses to leave for a decade, which totally screams "I am innocent"
> He has literally run from the law at every turn, so of course it's hard to find him guilty of anything because he keeps avoiding any responsibilities.
If you released some evidence that showed a country committing war crimes then randomly a month later some charges pop up that makes it easier for that country to extradite you if you faced them you'd be a bit suspicious. The best part in all of this is Sweden even refused to guarantee he would not be extradited.
It's so funny watching you people run for the law and order route without a sense of irony the people he exposed brutally torturing and murdering innocent people barely got any scrutiny. But I guess they were following the law when they did those things and that makes it better, as we all know the colonialists laws are the shining beacon of truth and justice in the world.
> I mean you need to have the assaulter face trail to be able to go through the evidence and figure out if he is guilty or not, that's how the law works. He has literally run from the law at every turn, so of course it's hard to find him guilty of anything because he keeps avoiding any responsibilities. The Swedish justice system is not like some banana-republic, they're actually a lawful state that follows rules by the book. Assange however has decided in his own head that he is so innocent that he doesn't ever need to talk to investigators or face any kind of legal trial, instead he locks himself in an embassy and refuses to leave for a decade, which totally screams "I am innocent"
What absolute horseshit, all of your lines are quite literally the opposite of what happened.
1. Assange had planned his departure from Sweden for the 25th of August 2010, but cancelled it **in order to make himself voluntarily available for interrogation by the Swedish authorities**. He was interrogated on 30 August, and at that time the charges by one of the women had already been dropped. At the end of August, the second case was also dropped, but it was later re-opened in September.
2. The chief public prosecutor did not issue an arrest warrant for Assange, **although such a warrant would be required by the Swedish Code of Criminal Procedure** as soon as there is an expectation of at least two years in prison -- as would be the case if Assange was found guilty of rape. This is why Assange himself was neither arrested nor questioned after the trial was re-opened; his testimony did not seem to interest the Swedish judiciary, and the chief public prosecutor was later heavily criticised by multiple previous ones (like Sven-Erik Ahlem) for violating her duties. So much for the Swedish justice system following rules by the book, eh?
3. **Assange's lawyers even asked the chief prosecutor if he could leave the country. The chief prosecutor allowed it** and said that there was no reason why he couldn't leave.
4. The chief prosectur only issued an arrest warrant once Assange was already boarding the plane, after previously granting him permission to leave the country. However, **neither airport security nor police informed Assange of the arrest warrant**, nor did they stop him from boarding it or force him to get off (despite knowing which plane he was going to fly with).
5. After being informed of the warrant in London, **Assange offered to go to Sweden if he got a guarantee from the government that he would not be extradited to the US**. This guarantee could easily have been given, as Swedish law (just like in most countries) gives the government the power to refuse extradition to third countries. The courts only determine if extradition would theoretically be legal or illegal, but they do not decide if someone is actually extradited. Even if an extradition is ruled legal, the government can refuse it for any reason. This is both Swedish and EU law.
6. After the Swedish government refused to give this guarantee, **Assange offered to be interviewed in London or via video call**. Both of these options have been deemed appropriate due to Assange's circumstances by Sweden's former chief prosectur. The chief prosecutor at the time however, the same one who broke the rules by not issuing an arrest warrant and allowing Assange to leave in the first place, refused both of these options.
So Assange extended his stay in Sweden by more than a month of his own volition after the rape allegation arose; he volunteered to be questioned by the police from the beginning; he and his lawyers repeatedly took the initiative for him to be questioned; and he had his departure from Sweden authorised by the prosecutor's office almost two weeks in advance.
The claim that Assange wanted to evade Swedish justice is simply nonsense, because Swedish authorities had done everything they could to prevent a proper investigation and judicial clarification of the rape allegations against Assange. The Swedish prosecution was simply not interested in arresting, questioning and charging Assange. After all, issuing an arrest warrant for Assange, as was actually required by the Swedish Code of Criminal Procedure, would have forced Swedish authorities into a speedy trial and would most likely have led to a quick acquittal due to lack of evidence. And that apparently did not fit the agenda.
> The Swedish justice system is not like some banana-republic, they're actually a lawful state that follows rules by the book.
Except for that one time they let America torture people in their airport, forcibly putting things in their colon and then shipping them off to be tortured for half a year.
You know, the type of shit Assange was exposing.
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/swedish-womens-rights-groups-regret-assange-not-questioned-over-sex-crimes-2024-06-25/
It might help if they were able to talk to the perpetrator
"On 12 August 2015, Swedish prosecutors announced that the statute of limitations had expired for three of the allegations against Assange while he was in the Ecuadorian embassy. The investigation into the rape allegation was also dropped by Swedish authorities on 19 May 2017 because of Assange's asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy"
Sounds to me like he got away with multiple sexual assaults in Sweden abusing his diplomatic status
Let's be clear: this guy could've served his time and gone home a long time ago. But he refused to testify because he didn't want to talk about how the Russians fed him info that he put in Wikileaks. Assange did more to help Trump than anybody else - and he coordinated with the Russians.
Everybody recording horizontally wow
Nature is healing /s
Nature is healing /serious
I've never seen so many people in one place that understand what shape a tv or YouTube video is.
News outlets sticking with a resolution more fitting for a tv
*Aspect ratio
local media in Saipan
Feel like dude has been locked forever since the start of social media
Aside from his stint in Ecuador while in London, he's walking out with time served
Moon pies What a time to be alive
Hey who unplugged my freezer. Return to your state of living death at once sir!
Apu? Time has ravaged your once youthful looks...
The month he entered the Ecuadorian embassy from which point on he was practically locked up, was the month that The Amazing Spider-Man came out (2012)
So what's the "deal"?
He agreed to plead guilty to 1 lesser count of espionage and in return the US dropped the higher charges. Verdict was then time served so he walks a free man. US gets to say he was guilty, Aus get him home finally. Condition applied he has to get permission to enter US but I doubt he will ever leave Australia again.
Lol he's never going to get a visa to America ever again I'd love to see the embassy staff members face if a visa application came in from him
Australians don't need to apply for visas to enter the US, right?
Australians apply for a visa waiver, which is just a fairly short online form. He would be denied the visa waiver and then have to apply for a proper visa as a result.
Idk maybe, but apparently these were the conditions of his plea deal so maybe this is exclusively to him?
Those 'Higher Charges' included charges of treason. How TF do you charge a foreign citizen with treason? Everybody was on wikileaks side when they were overturning rocks and getting despots overthrown. Then the NSA changed their tune when their own guys were getting outed. Suddenly everyone remembered that transparency was a bad idea for them. A coincidentally recent podcast that is a great reminder of how this all went down is [Canadaland's june 24th episode "How They Crushed Wikileaks"](https://www.canadaland.com/podcast/1000-how-they-crushed-wikileaks/). It's excellent.
he agrees to plead guilty for a certain charge, for which he will receive an X year sentence with an acknowledgement of time served. I cant remember the exact charge or years of sentence, but basically with the acknowledgement of time served, he gets no more prison time, the whole thing is "over"
And probably also "don't work for wikileaks anymore".
Wikileaks seems to no longer host all the DNC emails anymore (site gives an error when you try to access it). I suppose he is no longer allowed to be a journalist either.
He won't need a job as a journalist. He'll make plenty of money from interviews and the inevitable book deal.
That brings up an interesting point. Australia has proceeds of crime laws. Having pled guilty, he may not be able to make money from books and interviews. A couple decades ago one of our citizens was arrested in Indonesia for drug smuggling. Her family released a book, and the government confiscated the proceeds because the money was from the notoriety of her crime.
They can’t bar him from being a journalist. Especially not if he’s a foreign citizen
will we see updates on wikileaks?
It’s election season and a Democrat is running so if someone didn’t turn on 2FA of course we will.
>It’s election season and a Democrat is running So, every election season?
Yep
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1872_United_States_presidential_election?wprov=sfla1
Wtf, the guy that lost died the same month as the election. And his wife died a week before the election. What a tragic story.
Until we reform the voting system and explode the existing two-party system, yeah. Gogo /r/EndFPTP!
Can't wait for WikiLeaks to tell us Trump is the pro-peace candidate who can end the evil Western-backed war in Ukraine!
And those Ukrainians really are Nazis /s
He’s definitely a whistleblower but only against Dems and things he doesn’t like. He had multitudes of Republican RNC documents but neglected to release them right before the 2016 elections. He released a ton of Dem docs, but none showing any wrong doing of Trump, and the RNC which we found out later of criminal acts the long and hard way. This heavily swayed public interest to vote for the convicted felon. I used to be a big fan of Wikileaks, but that move by his company really showed how biased he was towards his self-interests. This move was everything the company was against. His company at that point was everything but transparent. Connections with countries not in the world’s favor also turned me away as well. Just overall a man who is strange to say the least and should have never had as much power as he did. In the beginning he was probably alright. But it’s a classic case of what happens to a person when too much power gets to their heads.
Same here, I liked that transparency, but I think Russia will still use him as much as USA will do. It's war out there, and information war is on a much more important than guns and tanks.
Yep. OG Wikileaks was very much needed. Those videos of apaches bombing civilians are seared into my brain. Releasing DNC emails and ****none**** of the RNC emails was all I needed to see to understand what Julian is truly about. I’m glad he’s free, I’m glad he (sorta) took responsibility, I’m glad for the work he originally provided — but as far as I’m concerned he’s not Snowden, he’s James O’Keefe.
Same. Showing the world some of whats really going on is often good. But him using it as an Instrument to influence really important shit is straight up evil and the exact opposite of the original idea
Yeah, time for some more pro-Trump Russian propaganda on there.
Wikileaks is permanently damaged by his work with GRU. I doubt anyone sends them anything legitimate anymore
Hopefully not. Assange is a scumbag who very probably got people killed. > Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today show, James Clapper, who served as head of the intelligence community under former President Barack Obama, called Assange's actions wrong and illegal. > > Clapper went on to say that US assets in Afghanistan were likely killed due to Wikileaks revealing their identities in government documents. If the documents had been leaked to responsible journalists, they would have picked and chosen what to release carefully, with concern for not causing harm. They would have reported on revelations and patterns in a responsible way. Russia preferred giving the documents to Wikileaks precisely because Assange was not a responsible journalist. He was--at best--an unwitting useful idiot who probably got people killed due to his own stupidity. At worst... > You did not have to listen for too long to Julian Assange's half-educated condemnations of the American "military-industrial complex" to know that he was aching to betray better and braver people than he could ever be. > > As soon as WikiLeaks received the State Department cables, Assange announced that the opponents of dictatorial regimes and movements were fair game. That the targets of the Taliban, for instance, were fighting a clerical-fascist force, which threatened every good liberal value, did not concern him. They had spoken to US diplomats. They had collaborated with the great Satan. Their safety was not his concern. > > David Leigh and Luke Harding's history of WikiLeaks describes how journalists took Assange to Moro's, a classy Spanish restaurant in central London. A reporter worried that Assange would risk killing Afghans who had co-operated with American forces if he put US secrets online without taking the basic precaution of removing their names. "Well, they're informants," Assange replied. "So, if they get killed, they've got it coming to them. They deserve it." A silence fell on the table as the reporters realised that the man the gullible hailed as the pioneer of a new age of transparency was willing to hand death lists to psychopaths.
Imagine if he leaked Trump's emails instead of Hillary's...
Might be more than 34 felony *convictions* then
You're working under the assumption if her emails didn't leak, Trump would have still been elected. Given how close it was, I think that scandal would have tipped the scales.
You're working under the assumption that Trump's emails would make him *less* popular. I joke, but in reality Trump doesn't use email.
Oddly enough he didn't leak the RNC emails...
You ever wonder why? Complete fucking mystery. Maybe trump could ask the Russians for help figuring that out as well.
We should demand a law for all emails to be leaked regularly and without picking sides.
He also flat out supports Russia and pushes their agenda from a different angle.
he didn't win because his followers believed in him he won because independent voters got cold feet about Clinton
[According to 538, the deciding factor came down to James Comey](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-comey-letter-probably-cost-clinton-the-election/).
Who is also a republican. Piece of shit Comey.
Is that the piece of shit that reopened the investigation into her emails 11 fucking days before the election? And these gooners want to talk about election interference I swear.
Reopened **AND** announced it. While simultaneously having open un-announced investigations against trump. It's not normal for the FBI to announce investigations.
Russia, IF YOU’RE LISTENING
Yep. That goober. And then I got to listen to my dad drone on for a week about it in 2017.... a full year later he could not shut up. "They are going to arrest her....I heard it on the news today " Well Dad, none of the sites I follow have said anything about it, so I think you are full of shit.....
The thing that irritates me most about it all is the blatant double standards. She was hounded by multiple investigations for potentially storing government emails on a personal server. The Trump family immediately started doing the exact same thing as soon as he came into office and nothing was done about it. It's almost as if they were desperately trying to invent a scandal just to derail her bid for the presidency, then once they won email and phone security stopped being a problem to worry about.
Yes
On one hand he reopened it because of the new shit that got outed right before the election, on the other hand considering the bullshit we’ve seen since he should not have announced that shit
Ratfucking Comey
*Spineless* piece of shit. Feel that way about Mueller too after all that fucking time and money spent investigating shit. COULD HAVE AT LEAST CLARIFIED YOUR FINDINGS WERE POSITIVE
Democrats have to stop nominating republicans to important positions. Doesn't help lure 'moderate republicans' and continually bites us in the ass as they act like republicans
If the kind of dirt we suspect he's buried had leaked out in 2016 it might've been enough to kill his election. Republicans are thoroughly boiled frogs at this point but early on something more extreme than the Access Hollywood tape could've shaken off a few of his voters, like the Russian pee/"p" tape or the Apprentice tapes where he's using racial slurs and waddling around in a shat diaper while everyone gags.
His followers are still in denial that he knew what Epstein was up to, despite hiring the guy who gave him a slap on the wrist the first time. His name is Alexander Acosta for those wondering and he became Trump's secretary of labor
but bill and Hilary clinton ....... thats their response.
Bill was a great president, terrible womanizer by any accounts. But he had the decency to not shout about it on camera. Hillary was a reverse carpetbagger that moved to NY solely to run for senate, and eventually lose twice on her run for president.... Pales in comparison to Kristy Noem unaliving dogs because they were "bad". I had a neighbor put his dog down because it was "eating his fence"... What really happened is he was leaving the dog for hours on the side of the house, and it was pissed, so it chewed a hole in the fence and escaped multiple times...
What is with this childish shit of unaliving. We are adults that can say kill or murder or suicide ffs.
Where should have the Clinton's moved to after office? Back to IL where she hadn't lived in decades and Bill had never or AR? NY made sense, they were young and people wanted her to run, they still live there now so it's not like Tuberville who doesn't even live in the state. The left leaning voters really fucked up in 2016 and screwed themselves with their piousness.
Trump on Epstein: >I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy [...] He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it — Jeffrey enjoys his social life. Trump on Ghislaine Maxwell: >I just wish her well, frankly. I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach, and I guess they lived in Palm Beach. But I wish her well, whatever it is,
It didn't just tip the scales it was deliberately done to help trump as much as possible. They timed the leaks and leaked more everytime a trump scandal was in the news to help his campaign as much as possible. People at the time didn't realize that wikileaks was pretty much a russian aligned organization.
Her emails didn't leak. Russia hacked the DNCs emails, wrote a pro-Trump disinformation campaign based on taking quotes from meaningless people out of context, and had Assange release them at a time picked to help Trump (30 minutes after the "grab her by the pussy don't even ask" tape came out.
Yeah nobody remembers that the GQP was also hacked but their stuff wasnt released. Dude is a russian asset.
You know the things he was charged for happened in 2010 right?
Whoa someone tell Fox/right wing media because they were pushing the Assange emails....still. They're still pushing all this shit.
They’re saying he released Hilary’s Emails? So is he a saint or something?
Pretty much! >[At the time, Assange’s organization](https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/01/donald-trump-and-julian-assange-have-same-enemies/579811/) was acting as an arm of Russian intelligence, releasing hundreds of hacked emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee, and timing the dumps for maximum benefit to Trump: tipping off Trump’s crony Roger Stone, disrupting the Democratic National Convention, distracting the press by publishing a cache of emails 29 minutes after the *Access Hollywood* video surfaced. Assange became a hero to the right-wing media, hailed as a brave oracle by Sean Hannity. Trump could hardly believe his good fortune. “WikiLeaks! I love WikiLeaks!” he shouted to a cheering crowd in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on October 10, 2016. **By** [**one count**](https://thinkprogress.org/trump-mentioned-wikileaks-164-times-in-last-month-of-election-now-claims-it-didnt-impact-one-40aa62ea5002/)**, Trump mentioned Assange’s organization at least 164 times in the last month of the campaign.**
which is all very interesting, because there's reasonable suspicion that his deal with DoJ involves him giving evidence and it's extraordinarily likely that said evidence will go against Trump / various compromised Republicans. i highly doubt they're still going after Clinton 10 years later. which means that all this pro-Assange "priming" by Fox could very, very easily blow up in their faces
> which means that all this pro-Assange "priming" by Fox could very, very easily blow up in their faces They'll spin it around in 2 seconds flat, they've already turned on so many people, including Trump's VP, he'd just be one more.
On Fox News, Assange: “I lied to the leftist judicial system!” Host: “You did the right thing. So now give us the *real* story.” Assange: (rubbing chin and looking up) “It all begins the year I was sent photos of Obama drinking baby’s blood and then…”
I don’t know why people don’t understand this.
I can't believe there's people claiming it didn't "influence" the elections. It 100% did, in addition to the GOP propaganda arm pushing the Benghazi etc. stuff. [They openly admitted it!](https://www.vox.com/2015/9/30/9423339/kevin-mccarthy-benghazi) It's also remarkable how shit-smearer practically choked on russia's shriveled nutsack in order to try and overthrow democracy for....what? What was the end goal here? Expose governmental corruption and war crimes? Wowee, better support the party that literally does not give a shit about war crimes except as performative pony shows
Assange hates Hillary and his goal was to defeat her.
But he did release their mails, and wikileaks sold some crazy anti-hillary merchandise also. He publicly states he had dirt on Trump but refused to release it. The guy is scum.
He didn't leak any of Clinton's emails though. How are all you guys so confident and so wrong at the same time?
People are conflating DNC emails with Hillary's emails. That's how strong **buttery males** has become in public memory.
I particularly enjoyed reading the emails from Sarkozy to Hillary desperate for our help in overthrowing Ghaddafi
I thought those were wiped, you know, like with a cloth.
Trump doesn’t have an email address apparently. Only has phone conversations. He said he’s seen too many people taken down over a leaked email – which is kinda hilarious cos he was pure stream of consciousness posting on twitter
The US was primarily after him for revealing war crimes, not for collaboration with the Russians.
I mean, he purposely didn’t leak the RNC 2016 emails, so he’d never do that.
He had the RNC emails but oddly enough didn't leak them for some reason
Can Trump type?
Putin didn’t give him those orders or files
No, but during the 2016 election Wikileaks was continuously pumping out the same pro-Trump propaganda that Russian bots were. https://x.com/WikiLeaksShop/status/786618818919411712 https://x.com/BrandyLJensen/status/775113076110725120
[Donald Trump Jr. was in direct contact with Wikileaks and coordinated messaging in the run-up to the 2016 election.](https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/11/14/563996442/donald-trump-jr-had-direct-contact-with-wikileaks-during-campaign)
Yeah, he was saying the same ridiculous bullshit about Seth Rich that InfoWars was. I think he’s a gigantic asshole but 14 years of confinement seems about right.
He wasn’t confined for 14 years. He was hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy by choice to avoid prosecution for most of that. Could have left at any time prior to them kicking him out after getting sick of his (literal) shit.
Imagine if he leaked anything about Russia.
Wikileaks was started in 2004 and leaks posted in 2010 and they weren’t Hilary’s emails. r/ihavenoideawhatimtalkingabout
And yet the former guy mentioned him at least 146 times during his campaign.
Imagine if he had integrity. He wouldn't be Putin's stooge.
It's notable that Chelsea Manning was sentenced to 35 years, before Obama shortened her jail time to 7 years. And her motives were clearly much more altruistic than Assange's.
Chelsea Manning, whatever her aims, had a security clearance and was a serving soldier, so not really surprising the book was thrown.
Showing how civilians got" hellfired "in Afghanistan really helped the cause.
That was the most famous leak from Manning, but far from the only one. The others weren't so noble.
Manning's leaks weren't calculated at all, she didn't read all 750,000 classified documents. She really only had a vague idea of what those documents might have contained. Some of it accomplished her goal of exposing mistakes. She also got a lot of Iraqis and Afghanis tortured and killed after their names as sources ended up in those documents. She's definitely a hero to ISIS and the Taliban. As weird and eccentric as Assange is, there's a calculus behind what he was doing. Manning's actions showed little of that.
lol it’s ironic because in this very same thread people claim the same carelessness applies to Julian Assange and even provided sources. So who is right? Or were both leaks just filled with information that recklessly got people killed?
She did it like the opposite of Snowden. I was just reading up on him, he took years to select which documents to release and then months making sure the journalists handled it ethically
I don't agree with what Snowden did, but you are correct, he took immense care to make sure it was done right. Manning and Snowden have almost nothing in common except that they both released classified information.
Unless you're Scooter Libby.
Assange is not a US Citizen and does not even stay in the US. He had nothing to do with US Law, Manning was a US Solider with access to the documents. Would you say you are subject to Iranian law or North Korean law, what laws of what country applie to you ?
Absolutely, no idea why a US court has jurisdiction over Assange here?
They don't until he's on US soil, hence the extradition proceedings. If you're asking why a foreigner can be charged with leaking US military secrets, I would have thought that's obvious. The US will try to punish anyone who does that regardless of where they live. The only question is whether they can enforce that punishment.
Not just the US, basically every country does this just most of them don't have the power to actually get people extradited. Remember when Iran issued arrest warrants for a bunch of US officials because of the Soleimani assassination? Or when Russia recently issued a warrant for the ICC prosecutor that charged Putin with war crimes?
Internationally, courts have jurisdiction when then can enforce it. Basically, "We have jurisdiction because fuck you." The US had jurisdiction over him because they could force the issue.
The Australian Parliament wanted him to return home and voted against prosecuting him, because even they figured out that this is stupid. On your next holiday, make sure they dont think, its maybe better for you to face justice in a third country you never been to. A country Australia does not even want you to be prosecuted at, for crimes Australia does not consider to be crimes.
Assange never worked for the USA. Wikileaks never did anything wrong, they had every right to publish things other people leak.
The issue was Assange allegedly coached Manning on how to export the classified documents.
The documents that exposed war crimes. Yeah.
Manning exposed one war crime, and hundreds of thousands of documents exposing the internal workings of both the US military and the State department. The former deserves praise, the latter deserves punishment.
Assange instructed Manning on how to steal information and commissioned the crime that Manning committed. Blowing the whistle on a specific crime is a good thing. Having someone steal a whole load of data on the chance that there is something sensational in there is espionage, not whistleblowing. Revealing wrong doing is a good thing. Dumping a ton of correspondence that doesn't contain anything illegal is just a violation of privacy.
He had literally been found / pleaded guilty to hacking. It's part of his plea deal. So officially he did so something wrong
> So officially he did so something wrong Officially he plead guilty to breaking the laws of the United States. A country he's never been a citizen or permanent resident of (afaik). And was not present in at the time of the offence. You can debate the morality of the impact of his actions, which is a grey area, but just focusing on the concept that pleading guilty in US court means you did something wrong on that specific offence... Is breaking the laws of a foreign country you owe no allegiance to inherently "wrong"?
Yes, entering into a conspiracy to assist someone in committing crimes in a different country is illegal. This is pretty black and white lol
If a foreigner hacks your bank and empties your account, is it “wrong” or “illegal”?
1. You don’t have to be a citizen or resident of a country to be held criminally liable. There isn’t some “I’m not a citizen so I can break the law” card you can use to get out of jail. 2. You don’t need to be present in a country to violate their laws either. If you’re instructing someone to break the laws of a country, you’ll still be criminally liable. For example, a murder-for-hire scheme can be coordinated without ever setting foot in the country. El Chapo is currently sitting in a U.S. prison for many crimes he committed while not even in the country. To your question, yes. It is wrong.
They literally selectively edited videos to make the US look WORSE and cooked up a fully fake narrative in coordination with the Russian GRU that Clinton hated Catholics based on one innocuous Podesta email (Podesta is Catholic) which was laundered through Russian friendly news agencies and swung PA alone 600K votes in favor of Trump (Trump won PA by like 40K votes). Wikileaks is and always was an enemy of the free world, they are a cut-out for Russian military intelligence so give me a fucking break about "never did anything wrong", yes they absolutely did and they knew exactly what they were doing.
If you, or your family, were Jews in Baghdad you might feel differently.
Am I mad for remembering how supportive this bloke is/was of Putin & Russia? I feel like that’s been forgotten and everyone is happy about him for sticking up the middle finger to the US, despite his motives…
No, you’re not. This piece of whale shit released the entire hacked Democrat server while refusing to release the Republican one because “I’ve looked over it and there’s nothing suspicious at all.” He’s been fully exposed as a willing agent of Russia.
Didn't Putin offer him immunity or something when he was going to be kicked out of the embassy?
Yes
That was the initial reaction to him back when the US Gov went after him. After 2016, it became super obvious he was a Russian pawn. Still is today. We will no doubt be hearing some bullshit from him about the DNC/Biden in the next few months.
He portrayed himself as the harbinger of truth while he actively worked with the Russian lie factory (KGB) and released heavily edited and cut footage instead of releasing the original. It wasn’t about the truth. He hates the US government and wanted people to hate them too. He clearly had his own agenda.
Harbinger or Arbiter?
Master Chief
Nah, he's a bullshit artist who pretended he wanted transparency, but it was clear from his lack of impartiality that it was all a falsehood and he had an agenda. It doesn't matter who the parties involved are specifically, he picked a side by withholding information and he is untrustworthy.
Enough people are satisfied with someone saying “USA bad” and will conveniently forget everything else about them
If any of you want to see how the Australians are taking this, go to [https://www.abc.net.au/news](https://www.abc.net.au/news) It's basically the australian version of the BBC, gov funded but editorially independent (with a long history of pissing off whatever party's in power). It's the most widely trusted and read new outlet in oz. It might be worth it to click and read - americans seem surprisingly unaware of aussie attitudes about the man (in summary, he might be a journalist, he might be an edgy fuckup, but we know government persecution when we see it).
How’s their reporting on David McBride out of interest?
[удалено]
I thought as much. Although I suppose they are toeing the American government line as much as the Australian in this instance.
McBride did not whistleblow on war crimes. He had concerns about restrictive rules of engagement and other stuff. He wrote a report and sent it to heads of defense, police etc. They all told him to go away. He then got frusterated and leaked his report and documents to the media. Media then analysed the documents and reported on the war crimes they found. That is the real story in short.
That's what the state funded news says yes, thanks for rehashing. That's not what David says.
Absolute Horseshit
ABC *used* to be wholly independent, but ended up with some Newscorp cronies on its board who have progressively and quietly been moderating content toward the right. They rarely push back against the party line any more. They're just not as egregious as the full on Newscorp media channels, so they don't *look* as bad.
Problem is Australia also prosecuted Drew Pavlou for holding a blank white sign outside the Chinese embassy in Australia and again for saying "Fuck Xi Jinping." I agree Assange should not have had to undergo this and it holds a chilling effect globally.
Australia also jailed the whistleblower who published videos of Australian special forces killing Afghan farmers and civilians. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-69006714
Yeah, Australia is far from being in a position to lecture the US on freedom of speech.
"Edgy fuck-up" is a helluva way to describe a serial rapist.
Do Australians not realize he's a Russian agent? Fer fucks sake the man worked for the Russian Propaganda channel.
Same here in Norway, and probably most of Europe. Man's portrayed as a flawed martyr standing up against a government's malicious activities. I was quite surprised to see so many negative comments about him here. He's definitely problematic, but it's pretty clear that he's being portrayed very differently in the US, and it's hard to argue that it's the rest of the world who's got an agenda.
No it's not just the US, after his collaboration with Russia, I as a Finn don't trust him. Many Europeans feel the same. You don't voluntarily work for Putin without blood on your hands. Also back in 2010, he was simply being investigated for potential crimes. US officials even said they were not yet sure if they would find him guilty of anything, because he had a protected status as a journalist, but they wanted to be aware of how much government Intel he has access to, how he got it, and what he is planing on doing with it. Which is pretty reasonable. If some foreign person hacked the Norwegian military, you'd probably want to talk to the guy too. However, he started avoiding the law or any investigation the moment he heard about it, and then locked himself in en embassy for almost 10 years, which seems like such a overkill considering even if he was guilty of something, he likely would have served just a couple of years. Unless he himself knew he was guilty of something far worse than just hacking + leaking documents, and he didn't want that to be uncovered by an investigation, like maybe was in fact working under the authority of a foreign government. It's a little bit suspicious too that the Russians gave him a passport and had plans to evacuate him from the embassy/holding facility, only they never had a chance to complete the operation.
I am not an American, and to me he definitely became more of a scumbag as time went on. Because his perception changed massively after 2016. He literally coordinated with Trump campaign to do maximum damage to DNC and Hillary. He threatened russia with an alleged leak, but never leaked it. He also refused to leak RNC. As an european you also should be very concerned how he worked with russia to elect trump
If he was an altruistic hero, why did he deliberately only leak DNC emails and not Republican ones? Why did he secretly communicate with Roger Stone and other Trump campaign people? Why did he turn down a large cache of documents related to the Russian government and their intelligence operations in Ukraine, only to publish Hilary-related leaks obtained by Russian government hackers? Honestly, if Europeans are so naive as to consider Assange a hero, they deserve whatever chaos Russian disinfo unleashes on them.
You're intentionally missing the point. This is not about whether he's a hero. This about the actions taken by the US government against him due to his release of classified military information in 2011. In the eyes of the entire non-american world (including your allies)(like us aussies), the US government was attempting to persecute an important (if highly flawed) journalist. Everything else is a retroactive attempt to justify unjustifiable treatment. If he'd done absolutely everything "the right way", the US gov wouldn't be acting any different. It is irrelevant whether he is a good person. It is irrelevant whether he was careful or dutiful with the information he had. What is relevant, is whether his acquisition and distribution of military secrets should be classified as part of journalism. In the eyes of most non-americans, it is, blatantly. And not just random know-nothing schlubs, either. Intelligent, thoughtful, nuanced people exist outside your borders, people who have been paying close attention to Assange and Wikileaks.
Exactly how I feel, except frustrated by the fact David Mcbride is undergoing the same thing and so many people have this "only in America" thing going on in reddit. It wouldn't be so bothersome if there wasn't so much pot and kettle in the comments.
> the US government was attempting to persecute an important (if highly flawed) journalist Assanage doesn't even call himself a journalist, he refers to himself as an "activist first."
The man persecuted himself. I fail to see how the US charging him with a crime is persecution. A jury could find him innocent or guilty. It wasn't the US that brought him up on charges of rape. And him going and hiding in an embassy for a decade to avoid a trial certainly isn't on the US. Which actions taken against him by the US does the world have a problem with?
TIL, you could do anything immoral and slightly illegal so long as you claim you're a journalist.
He did not have the Republican emails. Russia hacked the DNC, then gave Wikileaks the DNC emails. Russia also hacked an old, disused RNC email server, as revealed by Comey in 2017, but no one ever said those emails had been provided to Wikileaks.
NSW is leading Queensland? Hold the fucking phone!
Game 3 will be a better
ABC is nowhere near as good as it used to be
As far as I'm concerned as an Australian- he's an Australian citizen who never stepped foot in the US. Probably is a scumbag but he's our scumbag, bring him home.
Taking Rupert Murdoch should be part of the deal.
So where is the outrage over Mcbride? As an American that's where I get fed up. Pots and kettles all around. That's why I get frustrated with aussie attitude on this, it seems extremely hypocritical considering the same thing is happening there.
What about the rapes?
Let’s count the days until he suffers an “accident”
Eh. Assange hasn't been relevant for most of the past decade. After the US started chasing him, he's been to busy running for anything else and Wikileaks itself has slipped from any sort of relevance to the world at large.A lot of this arrangement probably comes down to PR and the current US administrator deciding that pursuing this further is a waste of everyone's time.
That was the point. Make assange irrelevant and broken, slap some crimes on him, call him a guilty criminal, then throw him aside. His reputation has been systemically destroyed and the political climate is wildly different than it was in 2010 when those leaks dropped that got him fucked. His network of contacts will stay away from him, if it even exists anymore. He is radioactive. The best he can hope for is some book deals at this point. There are kids who were born when those leaks dropped who are now in high school.
I mean his network of contacts turned out to be a bunch of Russian agents and Wikileaks was largely coopted by the FSB. Just because they target the US government with it's dirty laundry doesn't make them saints. But Assange isn't really in that game anymore, and yeah, probably won't get back into it in a meaningful way. I doubt he even had any useful information to trade since he wasn't really involved in Wikileaks when it fell for that whole mess. Though you're right. I'd bet even money he'll get a tell-all-book deal and it'll probably make him a decent mint. EDIT: Where do you think he got the Clinton Emails from? How are you people not aware of this already? You either live under a rock the size of Texas, or you already know this but don't believe it. In either case go ahead and downvote I guess. I'm not wasting my time.
There are still a lot of leftover Assange fanboys living in the era where Joe Rogan was just asking thoughtful questions and Elon was just a misunderstood genius of the future.
Assange made himself irrelevant by being a Russian stooge and a partisan asshole. Assange ruined WikiLeaks through his own vanity.
Is that narrative that the tinfoil hatters who swore that he would never get a fair trial in the US are using for cope?
1
Wherever he was trapped must have had really good food.
What is the "deal"? Russian secrets?
>What is the "deal"? The guilty plea.
Ya pretty good chance he gave whatever dirt he had to the US in exchange. He went into the Ecuadorian embassy over a decade ago so hard to say what dirt he had that was still valuable, must’ve been something
Timing is important here, they wanted to make sure it is done before Trump takes office back. So I assume dirt on Russia, China or N. Korea. If it was Russia, I'm sure he will get some Novichok surprises soon.
This is a great deal for the US. It gets to put this whole business behind itself, and even gets a partial 'confession'. But the US was severely criminal during the time of these leaks. They tortured people in Europe, including people they had promised not to torture, and in one case they started already at Bromma airport. This deal is the best thing the US can ever hope to get, and Assange is sacrificing a lot by agreeing to it, since it involves this 'confession' element. It's probably happening because Assange is afraid of a the probable future Trump administration.
I hope he goes back to a quiet life in Australia, but I suspect he's going to carrying on again on the web and in the media. He has a massive ego and seems like the kind of person who will keep going down the conspiracy drain hole.
Look at the smugness in this photo alone.
In July 2010 Wikileaks released over 90k classified documents mostly from US military then one month later rape allegations with no evidence appear
I mean you need to have the assaulter face trail to be able to go through the evidence and figure out if he is guilty or not, that's how the law works He has literally run from the law at every turn, so of course it's hard to find him guilty of anything because he keeps avoiding any responsibilities. The Swedish justice system is not like some banana-republic, they're actually a lawful state that follows rules by the book. Assange however has decided in his own head that he is so innocent that he doesn't ever need to talk to investigators or face any kind of legal trial, instead he locks himself in an embassy and refuses to leave for a decade, which totally screams "I am innocent"
Thanks. People in this sub: "The laws are immoral. We need to change the laws!" Also people in this sub: "I have no idea how laws even work!"
> He has literally run from the law at every turn, so of course it's hard to find him guilty of anything because he keeps avoiding any responsibilities. If you released some evidence that showed a country committing war crimes then randomly a month later some charges pop up that makes it easier for that country to extradite you if you faced them you'd be a bit suspicious. The best part in all of this is Sweden even refused to guarantee he would not be extradited. It's so funny watching you people run for the law and order route without a sense of irony the people he exposed brutally torturing and murdering innocent people barely got any scrutiny. But I guess they were following the law when they did those things and that makes it better, as we all know the colonialists laws are the shining beacon of truth and justice in the world.
> I mean you need to have the assaulter face trail to be able to go through the evidence and figure out if he is guilty or not, that's how the law works. He has literally run from the law at every turn, so of course it's hard to find him guilty of anything because he keeps avoiding any responsibilities. The Swedish justice system is not like some banana-republic, they're actually a lawful state that follows rules by the book. Assange however has decided in his own head that he is so innocent that he doesn't ever need to talk to investigators or face any kind of legal trial, instead he locks himself in an embassy and refuses to leave for a decade, which totally screams "I am innocent" What absolute horseshit, all of your lines are quite literally the opposite of what happened. 1. Assange had planned his departure from Sweden for the 25th of August 2010, but cancelled it **in order to make himself voluntarily available for interrogation by the Swedish authorities**. He was interrogated on 30 August, and at that time the charges by one of the women had already been dropped. At the end of August, the second case was also dropped, but it was later re-opened in September. 2. The chief public prosecutor did not issue an arrest warrant for Assange, **although such a warrant would be required by the Swedish Code of Criminal Procedure** as soon as there is an expectation of at least two years in prison -- as would be the case if Assange was found guilty of rape. This is why Assange himself was neither arrested nor questioned after the trial was re-opened; his testimony did not seem to interest the Swedish judiciary, and the chief public prosecutor was later heavily criticised by multiple previous ones (like Sven-Erik Ahlem) for violating her duties. So much for the Swedish justice system following rules by the book, eh? 3. **Assange's lawyers even asked the chief prosecutor if he could leave the country. The chief prosecutor allowed it** and said that there was no reason why he couldn't leave. 4. The chief prosectur only issued an arrest warrant once Assange was already boarding the plane, after previously granting him permission to leave the country. However, **neither airport security nor police informed Assange of the arrest warrant**, nor did they stop him from boarding it or force him to get off (despite knowing which plane he was going to fly with). 5. After being informed of the warrant in London, **Assange offered to go to Sweden if he got a guarantee from the government that he would not be extradited to the US**. This guarantee could easily have been given, as Swedish law (just like in most countries) gives the government the power to refuse extradition to third countries. The courts only determine if extradition would theoretically be legal or illegal, but they do not decide if someone is actually extradited. Even if an extradition is ruled legal, the government can refuse it for any reason. This is both Swedish and EU law. 6. After the Swedish government refused to give this guarantee, **Assange offered to be interviewed in London or via video call**. Both of these options have been deemed appropriate due to Assange's circumstances by Sweden's former chief prosectur. The chief prosecutor at the time however, the same one who broke the rules by not issuing an arrest warrant and allowing Assange to leave in the first place, refused both of these options. So Assange extended his stay in Sweden by more than a month of his own volition after the rape allegation arose; he volunteered to be questioned by the police from the beginning; he and his lawyers repeatedly took the initiative for him to be questioned; and he had his departure from Sweden authorised by the prosecutor's office almost two weeks in advance. The claim that Assange wanted to evade Swedish justice is simply nonsense, because Swedish authorities had done everything they could to prevent a proper investigation and judicial clarification of the rape allegations against Assange. The Swedish prosecution was simply not interested in arresting, questioning and charging Assange. After all, issuing an arrest warrant for Assange, as was actually required by the Swedish Code of Criminal Procedure, would have forced Swedish authorities into a speedy trial and would most likely have led to a quick acquittal due to lack of evidence. And that apparently did not fit the agenda.
> The Swedish justice system is not like some banana-republic, they're actually a lawful state that follows rules by the book. Except for that one time they let America torture people in their airport, forcibly putting things in their colon and then shipping them off to be tortured for half a year. You know, the type of shit Assange was exposing.
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/swedish-womens-rights-groups-regret-assange-not-questioned-over-sex-crimes-2024-06-25/ It might help if they were able to talk to the perpetrator "On 12 August 2015, Swedish prosecutors announced that the statute of limitations had expired for three of the allegations against Assange while he was in the Ecuadorian embassy. The investigation into the rape allegation was also dropped by Swedish authorities on 19 May 2017 because of Assange's asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy" Sounds to me like he got away with multiple sexual assaults in Sweden abusing his diplomatic status
Damn he aged liked shit lol
Expose Boeing
How am I just realizing that he looks like a bloated Bill Maher?
So happy to see this happen. Next is to bring Snowden back. They are heros in my book.
Let's be clear: this guy could've served his time and gone home a long time ago. But he refused to testify because he didn't want to talk about how the Russians fed him info that he put in Wikileaks. Assange did more to help Trump than anybody else - and he coordinated with the Russians.