The Biden administration has proposed to exchange convicted Russian arms trafficker Viktor Bout for Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan, according to persons briefed on the situation.
These sources informed that President Joe Biden backed the deal to trade Bout for Whelan and Griner. Biden’s backing for the swap trumps the Justice Department’s resistance to prisoner trades.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov: “No agreement yet.” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the US made a “serious proposal” for Whelan and Griner “weeks ago”
Blinken stated Biden “personally involved” and approved the proposal. Blinken did not confirm whelan was part of the deal, saying he “can’t and won’t get into any of the details of what we proposed to the Russians over the course of so many weeks,” but he said “the President was not only directly involved, he signs off on any proposal that we make, and certainly when it comes to Americans who are arbitrarily detained abroad, including in this specific case.”
The senior US diplomat said he planned to discuss the issue with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov this week — his first talk with his colleague since the Ukraine crisis began — telling reporters, “I hope to accelerate efforts to bring them home.”
“Clear, direct statements to the Russians about our goals are useful. These include Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan’s homecoming home “saying
A senior administration official has stated that Moscow has not responded to the June “significant offer.”
“We start all negotiations to bring home Americans held hostage or wrongfully detained with a bad actor on the other side. We start all of these with somebody who has taken a human being American and treated them as a bargaining chip,” the official said. “So in some ways, it’s not surprising, even if it’s disheartening, when those same actors don’t necessarily respond directly to our offers, don’t engage constructively in negotiations.”
Official wouldn’t comment on “significant offer.” They claimed it was up to Russia to respond, but they continued to express the offer at high levels.
Families of Whelan, held by Russia for alleged espionage since 2018, and Griner, incarcerated in Moscow for drug use since February, have pushed the White House to seek their release, even through a prisoner exchange.
The Justice Department rejected exchanging Bout throughout months of internal conversations, sources say. Justice authorities recognized that top State Department and White House officials, including Biden, support a Bout exchange, sources say.
The Russian government has proposed trading Bout for several Americans. CIA Director Bill Burns said last week at the Aspen Security Forum that Viktor Bout is a “creep”
“The Russians have expressed interest in Victor Bout’s return, but those are, as I learnt as a diplomat, very delicate situations,” he remarked.
John Kirby said a senior administration official spoke with families before Blinken’s announcement. Biden called Griner’s wife and Whelan’s sister.
Griner, who pled guilty in early July but said she unintentionally carried cannabis into Russia, testified in a Russian tribunal Wednesday. US officials acquainted with the Russian judicial process and US-Russia negotiations say her trial must end before a deal is finalized.
The US has historically opposed prisoner swaps, alleging they encourage governments to imprison Americans as bargaining tools. Advocates say it’s more vital for Americans to return home.
After the release of Trevor Reed, a former Marine jailed in Russia for more than two years, the idea of prisoner swaps gained traction in the Biden administration. Reed was traded for a Russian pilot serving 20 years for cocaine smuggling. Biden officials worried Republicans would condemn the Reed-Yaroshenko exchange. Instead, it earned bipartisan plaudits, including from some Republican administration critics. The administration reexamined all options, including swaps, to get Whelan and Griner out of Russia, sources say.
“We are so devoted to bringing our people home that we will make terrible choices in certain cases,” an administration official told CNN.
Securing their release would provide the White House a much-needed political gain before the November midterms, our sources confirmed ” Families of Americans wrongfully jailed abroad are putting pressure on the White House to bring the two detainees home”.
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ISTHATPORKS TAKE:
Makes all the sense in the world for there to be a deal made for the swap of these two. Sometimes you have to weigh the options and realize that "my problems should not be the problem of others." Seems like Biden is doing that to get Brittney home. Hope it works for Brittney's sake. Biden can figure out the rest later. NO PORK IN THAT!
Former Independent Counsel Ken Starr, who was instrumental in the impeachment of former President Bill Clinton, has passed away.
Starr passed away on Tuesday at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center in Houston, Texas… owing to postoperative problems… that’s what his relatives say.
Starr led the massive Whitewater investigation of the Clintons in the 1990s and is famous for this. The investigation started with the Clintons’ real estate dealings and widened to encompass the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal.
Starr’s career as an attorney was highly successful… It was Reagan who put him forward for a position on the Supreme Court of the United States. District of Columbia Court of Appeals. Later becoming U.S. Secretary of State under former President George H.W. Bush. State Department’s top lawyer.
Starr was a United States Circuit Judge for the District of Columbia and argued 36 cases before the Supreme Court. He worked as an associate attorney general under William French Smith and as a law clerk for Warren E. Burger.
Active in the field of higher learning, during his 25 years of teaching, he has held positions at New York University, George Mason University, Pepperdine University, Chapman University, and Baylor University. In addition to his role as President and Chancellor of Baylor, Starr formerly served as Dean of the Pepperdine University School of Law.
Starr attended Sam Houston High School and Trinity University to receive his Bachelor of Arts after he was born and raised in San Antonio, Texas. He earned an M.P.S. in political science from Brown and a J.D. from Duke.
Ken’s children, Randall, Carolyn, and Cynthia, and his wife of 52 years, Alice Mendell Starr, survive him.
In a statement released in Starr’s son’s honor, the family expressed their “deep sadness at the loss of our dear and loving Father and Grandfather, whom we admired for his prodigious work ethic, but who always put his family first. The love, energy, endearing sense of humor, and fun-loving interest Dad exhibited to each of us was truly special, and we cherish the many wonderful memories we were able to experience with him.”
The visitation will be held on September 23 in Waco, and the burial will take place in the Texas State Cemetery in Austin.
A 76-year-old Starr in some circles of politics passed away.
CHERYENNE, Wyoming. Following a crushing defeat in the Wyoming Republican primary to an opponent sponsored by former President Donald Trump, Representative Liz Cheney became increasingly outspoken on Wednesday about considering a 2024 presidential candidacy.
The three-term congressman stated on NBC that Trump poses ““a very grave threat and risk to our republic,” adding that she plans to join “a broad and united front of Republicans, Democrats, and independents” to stop him.
She wouldn’t confirm or deny whether or not she was considering a presidential run, but she did admit, “it’s something that I’m thinking about.”
The primary results, especially her loss by more than 35 points, highlighted the swift rightward movement within the Republican Party. Trump’s populist appeal and, more than anything else, his rejection of loss in 2020 have transformed the Republican Party, which was once dominated by national security-focused, business-friendly conservatives like her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney.
The claims have been rejected by federal and state election officials as well as Trump’s own attorney general and judges he selected, turning Cheney from an occasional critic of the former president into the strongest voice within the GOP warning that he constitutes a threat to democratic principles. She alluded to her political future by mentioning that she is the ranking Republican on the House panel looking into the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol by a mob of Trump supporters on January 6, 2021.
“I have said since Jan. 6 that I will do whatever it takes to ensure Donald Trump is never again anywhere near the Oval Office — and I mean it,” she said during her concession speech on Tuesday.
Cheney addressed a small group of supporters, including her father, on the edge of a large field framed by mountains and bales of hay on Wednesday morning, and she described her primary loss from Tuesday night as the beginning of a new chapter in her political career.
“Our work is far from over,” she said, evoking Abraham Lincoln, who also lost congressional elections before ascending to the presidency and preserving the union.
Celebratory Hageman supporters, many of whom were dressed in cowboy boots, hats, and blue jeans, congregated for a massive outdoor rodeo and Western cultural celebration in Cheyenne, some 400 miles (645 kilometers) to the east of Cheney’s concession address.
Hageman, an attorney for the ranching business who came in third in a previous run for governor, expressed his gratitude to President Trump for recognizing the importance of Wyoming’s lone congressional representative.
She courted Trump’s supporters by echoing his conspiracy theories and saying the 2020 election was “rigged,” which is demonstrably wrong.
As Trump’s largest political triumph of the primary season, Cheney’s defeat was cause for celebration among Trump and his staff. The former president has described the findings as “a complete condemnation” of the January 6 committee.
He said of Cheney, “Liz Cheney should be ashamed of herself, the way she acted, and her spiteful, sanctimonious words and actions towards others,” he wrote on his social media platform. “Now she can finally disappear into the depths of political oblivion where, I am sure, she will be much happier than she is right now. Thank you WYOMING!”
Meanwhile, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, another major Republican critic of Trump, advanced from her primary in Alaska, which also took place on Tuesday. In the contest for Alaska’s lone U.S. House seat, Sarah Palin, the GOP’s 2008 vice presidential contender and a fervent admirer of Trump, was also headed for the general election in November.
The focus, though, was on Cheney, whose defeat just two years ago seemed impossible. She comes from a prestigious political family in Wyoming, as her father was the state’s vice president. Moreover, she was the third-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, making her a powerful figure in party politics and policy and ensuring that she had a solidly conservative voting record.
Now that Cheney has reached the end of her third and final term in Congress, she will be compelled to leave office in January. No one will be expecting her to exit Capitol Hill quietly.
She will remain in charge of the congressional group until its dissolution at the end of the year, when the probe into the attack on January 6 will have concluded. She has sworn to do all in her power to combat Trump’s influence in her party, and she is seriously considering a run for the White House in 2024, either as a Republican or as an independent.
On Thursday, Attorney General Merrick Garland said he personally approved the search warrant that was used to raid Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
Garland also disclosed that the Department of Justice has submitted a motion to unseal an FBI property receipt and a search warrant.
“Federal law, long-standing department rules, and our ethical obligations prevent me from providing further details as to the basis of the search at this time. There are, however, certain points I want you to know,” Garland said.
“First, I personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant in this matter. Second, the department does not take such decisions lightly.”
Given Trump’s “public confirmation of the search,” the circumstances surrounding the search, and the considerable public interest in this subject, Garland said they decided to move to unseal the materials.
The warrant and the FBI’s receipt were “given to the former president’s attorney who was on-site during the search,” Garland added.
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