Published time: September 04, 2013 00:56
Chelsea Manning, the former Army private sentenced to 35 years in prison for the largest data leak in US history, has formally submitted a pardon request to President Obama.
The former Army private was convicted of espionage and theft on
August 21 in connection with illegally turning over 700,000 US
diplomatic cables, battlefield reports, and combat video to the
anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks.
Formerly known as Bradley, Manning, 25, said after sentencing
that she wanted to live as a woman, requesting media refer to her
as Chelsea.
A presidential pardon could allow Manning to leave Fort
Leavenworth prison in Kansas and re-enter society as a civilian.
The president has the ability to grant a full and unconditional
pardon, to commute a sentence, or to rescind a fine.
Manning’s attorney, David Coombs, announced the news on Twitter
earlier Tuesday. Coombs previously announced that he would seek a
pardon for Manning and planned to include a personal plea from
Manning to Obama.
“When I chose to disclose classified information, I did so out
of a love to my country and a sense of duty to others,”
Manning would tell Obama, Coombs said. “If you deny my request
for a pardon, I will serve my time knowing that sometimes you
have to pay a heavy price to live in a free society. I will
gladly pay that price if it means we could have a country that is
truly conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that
all women and men are created equal.”
By March of this year, Obama granted 39 pardons, 17 of which were
granted in that month alone. Obama has granted fewer pardons than
his predecessors traditionally have. For example, President
George W. Bush granted 200 pardons during his eight years in
office.
While Obama has offered the public little insight into the
Manning case, he did comment on the unauthorized data disclosure
at a California fundraiser in 2011.
“I have to abide by certain classified information,” Obama
is heard saying on a widely circulated video. “If I was to
release stuff, information that I’m not authorized to release,
I’m breaking the law…We’re a nation of laws. We don’t
individually make our own decisions about how the laws operate…He
broke the law.”
Media pundits have fallen on both sides of the issue, with some
calling Manning a hero and others likening the former
intelligence analyst to notorious American traitors. Daniel
Pneuman wrote Tuesday in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that
Manning is a mere casualty of the secrecy state that has expanded
under the president.
“Obama stated in 2008, ‘Government whistleblowers are part of
a health democracy, and must be protected from reprisal,’”
Pneuman wrote. “We hope he lives up to the statement he made
about whistle-blowers while he was on the campaign trail. Will
2013 Obama reject 2008 Obama’s courageous statement about
whistle-blowers?”
Republished from: RT