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Ackerman writes: "WikiLeaks, a central figure in the 2016 election and the recipient of an email trove stolen by Russian intelligence, is 'considering the offer.'"

Julian Assange. (photo: Peters Nicholls/Reuters)
Julian Assange. (photo: Peters Nicholls/Reuters)


Senate Asks Julian Assange to Testify in Russia Investigation

By Spencer Ackerman, The Daily Beast

08 August 18


WikiLeaks, a central figure in the 2016 election and the recipient of an email trove stolen by Russian intelligence, is ‘considering the offer.’

he Senate Intelligence Committee’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election wants to talk to a potential blockbuster witness: Julian Assange.

Assange, the driving force behind WikiLeaks, remains in Ecuador’s embassy in London, where he has lived since seeking asylum in June 2012 following a now-dropped rape investigation in Sweden. His presence in the embassy means that the Senate’s requested interview is packed with geopolitical and legal complications—like much about WikiLeaks circa 2018.


WikiLeaks tweeted Wednesday morning that the Senate panel, in an August 1 letter, sought an interview. The Senate Intelligence Committee declined comment.

The self-styled radical transparency group, which U.S. intelligence believes is a catspaw of Russian intelligence, quoted its legal team to say it is “considering the offer but testimony must conform to a high ethical standard,” presumably meaning on the part of the Senate staff who would conduct the interview.

WikiLeaks is a central player in Russia’s 2016-era active-measures campaign and surreptitiously interacted with Donald Trump’s successful presidential bid.

In the summer and fall of 2016, WikiLeaks published thousands of emails and documents from the Democratic National Committee’s servers and from Hillary Clinton senior aide John Podesta, which were pilfered by Russian intelligence. An online personae calling itself Guccifer2.0—and posing as a “lone hacker”—said publicly that it provided the material to WikiLeaks, which released it during politically critical moments.

But according to Daily Beast reporting and special prosecutor Robert Mueller, Guccifer2.0 was a fictitious entity created by the GRU, Russian military intelligence. In an indictment last month, Mueller alleged “Organization 1,” whose behavior matches that of WikiLeaks, solicited the Democratic National Committee’s internal emails from Guccifer 2.0 around June 22, 2016, a month before WikiLeaks ultimately published. “[S]end any new material [stolen from the DNC] here for us to review and it will have a much higher impact than what you are doing,” the organization asked Guccifer2.0, according to Mueller. About two weeks later, “Organization 1” specifically asked Guccifer2.0 for “anything hillary related” before the imminent Democratic National Convention.  


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