[matthewdgreen]

My recollection is that the Obama administration was split on this, with DoJ officials enthusiastic but Obama purportedly being concerned about the political implications for journalism. The charges were only filed in 2018/2019 under the Trump administration, which presumably did not have major concerns about journalism. Am I wrong in this?

[GeekyBear]

The DOJ and the Obama administration were in agreement that you would have had to prosecute the papers and journalists who had previously run stories on the Bush era leaks revealed through Wikikeaks as well.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/julia...

[throwawaythekey]

I'm trying to work this out myself. Julian's wiki page has

> He was granted asylum by Ecuador in August 2012[10] on the grounds of political persecution and fears he might be extradited to the United States.[11]

It seems to me like the Trump administration simply mainted the status quo of what came before them. One theory could be the timing of the charges was more aligned with Ecuador changing PM/kicking Assange out of the embassy. https://thegrayzone.com/2019/04/14/lenin-moreno-julian-assan...

[rootusrootus]

> concerned about the political implications for journalism

As I recall, Wikileaks made the choice to take sides in politics, so the blame lies with them.

[whatshisface]

Without starting the whole "is publishing documents received from an enemy of the state seditious," debate, I didn't think there was supposed to be a jail term on taking sides in politics. :-)

[vkou]

No, but there may be jail terms for assisting your source in accessing computer networks in order to leak that information.

[alfiedotwtf]

Hillary wanted to drone Assange, so you would expect Wikileaks to take her opponent’s side