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Donald Trump says he will give “very serious consideration” to pardoning Julian Assange if he is re-elected US president.
The Australian is currently in prison in the UK pending an appeal against his extradition to the US, where he faces charges over material published on his WikiLeaks website.
Mr Trump was asked about the case by podcaster Tim Pool, who recorded an interview with the former president before he addressed the Libertarian Party’s national convention in Washington at the weekend.
“Will you pardon Julian Assange?” Pool asked the former president.
Mr Trump responded: “Well, I’m going to talk about that today, and we’re going to give it very serious consideration. And we’re going to have a couple of other things to say in the speech that I think you’re going to love.”
However, Mr Trump did not specifically address Mr Assange’s situation in his speech. He did say he would “appoint a special taskforce to rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner who’s been unjustly persecuted by the Biden administration”.
He went on to repeat his pledge to pardon supporters who had been jailed over the January 6 Capitol riot, as well as Ross Ulbricht, a black-market website operator who was sentenced to life in prison in 2015.
Mr Trump was heckled and booed at times during his speech, including after he suggested the Libertarian Party should endorse his presidential run.
“That’s nice. Only if you want to win,” he said as he was booed by the crowd. “Maybe you don’t want to win… keep getting your 3 per cent every four years.”
Mr Assange’s brother, Gabriel Shipton, attended the Libertarian Party conference after meeting with members of Congress during the week.
Democratic Congressman Jim McGovern, who has been urging President Joe Biden to drop the prosecution, said the case had brought together “some strange bedfellows” from across the political spectrum to lobby for Mr Assange’s freedom.
“There are some pretty right-wing, you know, conservative Republicans who have also joined with us in making a request to our administration to move on, to move beyond this,” he told the ABC.
But he warned Mr Assange’s supporters against putting too much faith in Mr Trump’s comments.
“I don’t want to read too much into what Donald Trump says, because I can’t understand what goes through his mind. But it was his administration that moved forward with the extradition request.”
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Lobbying efforts
For years, the US has been trying to have Mr Assange extradited from the UK, so he can face trial over the publication of classified information relating to the US-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Last week, London’s High Court ruled Mr Assange could lodge another appeal against his extradition after finding he could be discriminated against in the US judicial system because he is Australian.
A date for the appeal has not been set.
Mr Assange faces 18 charges in the US; 17 of them under the Espionage Act, which could see him jailed for life.
Mr Assange’s supporters have argued that represents a criminalisation of journalism and the stifling of free speech. But Mr Assange’s critics say he put lives in danger by releasing documents containing the unredacted names of US intelligence sources.
The Australian House of Representatives passed a motion in February calling for Mr Assange to be returned home.
In April, US President Joe Biden was asked if he had a response to Australia’s request that he end Mr Assange’s prosecution. “We’re considering it,” he said in response.
However, the White House and Department of Justice have since refused to elaborate, or otherwise comment on the case.
“I do think he needs to move faster,” Mr McGovern said. “I hope he is genuinely considering the request.”
In 2020, A US Senate report said Russia had used WikiLeaks to help Mr Trump defeat Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.
Before the election, the website published a trove of emails from Ms Clinton’s campaign, which the US government said were stolen in a Russian hack.