WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was swiftly taken into British custody after his asylum at Ecuador’s London embassy came to an end. Extradition to the U.S. was immediately issued, and the man who exposed potential combat misconduct and later unmasked Hillary Clinton’s private email server while Secretary of State remains an iconic figure.
Depending on where your allegiances lay, he’s either a hero of the people or a nation-state villain. Everyday Americans will need to decide for themselves as the Australian-born foreign national faces charges in U.S. courts.
Why Julian Assange Might Be A Villain
Founded in 2006, WikiLeaks has reportedly published more than 10 million documents since Assange created the Iceland-based organization. In large part, much of the early information WikiLeaks and Assange published pointed to garden variety political corruption and embarrassment. That all changed when U.S. soldier Bradley Manning committed espionage and WikiLeaks released damaging classified footage and information about the War on Terror.
A shocking video now known as the infamous “Collateral Murder” footage shows an American Apache helicopter crew laugh and joke as they open fire on a group of individuals that included embedded Reuters journalists. A second strike was fired on a rescue team and van trying to assist the wounded. The footage stunned the world, and brought a fierce backlash against the U.S. military. It also embarrassed the Obama Administration, which had persuaded the mainstream media that its field protocols were above reproach.
Assange and his colleagues went on to publish numerous sensitive U.S. military documents from the Manning cache that included so-called Afghanistan and Iraqi war logs. The website also published Cable Gate, a series of embassy level communications that upended American interests. Assange and his minions caused an international backlash against Americans working around the world.
Members of the Obama Administration were roundly disgraced, and the WikiLeaks revelations brought dishonor to the office of the president itself. Although this was a dark day for American respectability, Assange would double-down in 2016 by releasing emails sent and received from Hillary Clinton’s controversial private email server while she was Secretary of State.
“The bottom line is he has to answer for what he has done, at least as it’s been charged,” Clinton said after Assange’s arrest.
The dialogues humiliated Democrats and exposed American security vulnerabilities. If Assange is a villain, it’s primarily due to the foreign and domestic embarrassment the country suffered due to the exposés.
Why Julian Assange Might Be A People’s Hero
Although politicians and certain liberal media outlets may seek to vilify Assange, the reality is that never has the truthfulness of WikiLeaks ever been questioned. We live in the fake news era in which liberal outlets seek to hide facts and mislead Americans for political gain.
“I have to tell you, in my opinion, Julian Assange is a hero. What he published was truthful information that the American public and the world had the right to see,” Judge Andrew Napolitano said on Fox News.
In many ways, Assange is a throwback journalist who publishes original documents and only factual information. Without WikiLeaks, everyday Americans would never have known about Hillary’s gross disregard for classified information. The subsequent coverup by the Obama Administration and the attempts by deep state Democrats in the FBI and DOJ would likely have never been exposed either.
In many ways, Assange did America an unprecedented service. If not for his work in bringing such true facts to light, Hillary would likely be president. The seemingly unending Clinton corruption would have kicked into high gear, and James Comey, Andrew McCabe, and Peter Strzok would still be calling the shots at the FBI. Although initially painful, WikiLeaks changed the course of American politics forever.
Another critical reason Assange might be viewed as a people’s hero is due to the fact he has been persecuted and hunted for providing the world with truthful information. Before the release of the 2010 war footage and documents, Assange had been investigated and cleared of sexual misconduct in Sweden. Those charges came back with a vengeance after the documents drop. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that Obama threatened Sweden over banking privacy to gin up the charges.
In fact, while Assange was awaiting trial in Sweden, Obama cut a deal to have him extradited to the U.S., considered a direct violation of Swedish law. He was forced to take up refuge at the Ecuadorian embassy in London to maintain his freedom.
“There’s no basis to arrest him in London for the sexual assault investigation in Sweden,” Judge Napolitano said. “He apparently has been charged with something in the United States. We don’t know. Because of this inadvertent release of a warrant for him. That is probably the true reason for his arrest. He will probably be extradited here. We will see the indictment. And we will probably have a show trial.”
It should also be clear that Assange is also a foreign national the U.S. courts have no jurisdiction over. The fact that governments around the world are willing to break their own laws and operate like criminal organizations to lock one man up is telling. Julian Assange may just be the people’s hero, and his superpower is telling the truth.
~ Patriotic Freedom Fighter
