August 8, 2018

The Senate Intelligence Committee Wants to Interview Julian Assange

WikiLeaks announced the investigators’ request to speak at a “mutually agreeable…location.”

Julian Assange.Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire via ZUMA Press

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The Senate’s Intelligence Committee has asked to speak with Julian Assange as part of its investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 elections, WikiLeaks announced in a Wednesday morning tweet.

In a letter signed by Sens. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and Mark Warner (D-Va.), the chair and vice-chair of the committee, respectively, the senators ask Assange to “make [himself] available for a closed interview with bipartisan Committee staff at a mutually agreeable time and location.” WikiLeaks said the organization’s legal team is “considering the offer but the conditions must conform to a high ethical standard.” 

Spokeswomen for both Burr and Warner declined to comment on the letter or verify its authenticity, which Wikileaks said had been delivered via the US embassy in London. Barry Pollack, Assange’s Washington, D.C.-based lawyer, confirmed the committee’s request.

The letter comes as reports suggest the government of Ecuador may be considering ending the six-year stay Assange has undertaken at its London embassy to avoid the possibility of being extradited to the United States. Assange’s legal team maintains he remains under legal jeopardy, pointing to reports going back at least seven years that the US government has been exploring charging Assange for his role in the publication of hundreds of thousands of documents leaked by Chelsea Manning in 2010.

This post has been updated to include comment from Pollack.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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