Edward Snowden has made an emotional plea to President Obama over Twitter on Wednesday asking him to pardon whistleblower and U.S. Army soldier Chelsea Manning.
“Mr. President, if you grant only one act of clemency as you exit the White House, please: free Chelsea Manning. You alone can save her life,” Snowden tweeted.
Snowden’s plea was significant because he wrote that he would prefer Chelsea Manning to receive a pardon as opposed to receiving a pardon himself.
Snowden is a former NSA contractor who copied and leaked information from the NSA without authorization in 2013. Since then, he has lived in exile in Russia.
In 2010, Chelsea Manning leaked roughly 700,000 classified or unclassified, but sensitive military and diplomatic documents, to Wikileaks. In 2013, Manning was sentenced to 35 years imprisonment and was dishonorably discharged from the Army.
Early Wednesday, NBC News reported that a Justice Department source told them that Manning is on the short list for possible commutation.
Last month, more than 100,000 people signed a petition seeking commutation for Manning’s sentence.
Obama told German newspaper Der Spiegel in November that he won’t pardon Edward Snowden during his last few months in office.
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