Blueprint: Biden Administration Must Pardon Julian Assange

As the Biden administration takes office, Blueprint for Free Speech highlights the threat the US prosecution of WikiLeaks publisher and journalist Julian Assange represents to First Amendment rights and freedom of expression worldwide.

The new presidential administration should provide a pardon for Assange; journalism is not a crime.

Blueprint for Free Speech board member Mark Davis said:

“Journalists need to be able to ask for evidence when their sources make claims, without worrying about ending up in prison or being extradited to a foreign country for doing so.

"The Assange case should be high on the agenda of the incoming administration. Even if Julian Assange wins his fight against extradition in the UK, the US indictment will still exert a chilling effect on investigative journalists and national security reporters everywhere,” he said.

Blueprint for Free Speech would like to thank Ms Pamela Anderson for her humanitarian and free speech activism relating to this important public interest legal case. We also thank Mr Robert Stryk of of Stryk Global Diplomacy for bringing the First Amendment ramifications of the Assange case to the attention of a wide spectrum of US congressional representatives, as well as the current and previous presidential administrations

Julian Assange risks extradition from the UK to the US to face criminal charges relating to his media organisation’s reportage. The extradition was halted by a UK court on health grounds on 4 January and an appeal is pending. Mr Assange is currently incarcerated at high-security Belmarsh Prison in southeast London.

Blueprint for Free Speech is an international NGO that works to secure the right to freedom of expression, including media freedoms and whistleblower protections.