Julian has arrived at the federal court house in Saipan.

I watch this and think how overloaded his senses must be, walking through the press scrum after years of sensory depravation and the four walls of his high security Belmarsh prison cell.

pic.twitter.com/BzgkpWPXdy

— Stella Assange #FreeAssangeNOW (@Stella_Assange) June 25, 2024

Update 3 (5:20 PM EST)

• Julian Assange landed in Saipan at 4:14 PM EST according to Stella Assange via X. Assange’s court hearing is expected to start around 7:00 PM EST. According to an AP report, “The U.S. Justice Department agreed to hold the hearing on the remote island because Assange opposed coming to the continental U.S. and because it’s near Australia, where he will return after he enters his plea.


• According to The New York Times, Assange amassed a $520,000 debt to the Australian government in order to charter his flight to Saipan and then to Australia. Stella Assange posted a crowd fundraiser on X.

Update 2 (2:58 PM EST)

• Stella Assange tells Reuters that she will seek a pardon for Julian Assange following the plea agreement. “The fact that there is a guilty plea under the Espionage Act in relation to obtaining and disclosing national defense information is obviously a very serious concern for journalists and national security journalists in general,” Assange said.

Stella Assange says she will seek a pardon for her husband, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, adding that the prosecution was a ‘very serious concern’ for journalists around the world https://t.co/JQZkVdbwee pic.twitter.com/bfSHngbCmk

— Reuters (@Reuters) June 25, 2024

• Gabriel Shipton, Julian Assange’s brother, spoke to MSNBC and expressed his happiness for Assange’s return as well as gratitude for the American people who have supported the effort. Shipton also acknowledge the support from people in Congress such as Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA), Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ).

MSNBC – 6/25/2024 – Interview with @GabrielShipton, on the release of his brother Julian Assange pic.twitter.com/fhmgI3lg8R

— CaseStudyQB – #CeaseFireNOW (@CaseStudyQB) June 25, 2024

• As of 1:33 PM EST, Julian Assange was 2.5 hours away from arriving in Saipan, according to Stella Assange.

2.5h to go until Julian Assange arrives in Saipan. #AssangeJet

Live tracker: https://t.co/mBl7pYKMId https://t.co/0S1DVmFOKR pic.twitter.com/G9Jc7dHgQ2

— Stella Assange #FreeAssangeNOW (@Stella_Assange) June 25, 2024

Update 1 (12:27 PM EST)

Assange’s flight to Saipan Island, a US territory, has taken off from Bangkok, Thailand as of 11:37 AM EST, according to WikiLeaks. Stella Assange and WikiLeaks, in separate X posts, have asked people to keep track of his flight using a flight tracking website, stating that Assange will not be safe until he is in Australia.

Julian Assange’s flight VJT199 has just taken off from Bangkok, heading towards US airspace and Saipan Island. All eyes on #AssangeJet. pic.twitter.com/2ZxOPZ96FF

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) June 25, 2024

Flight VJ199 will soon take off for Saipan.

Saipan is a remote US overseas territory. He will be entering the United States. Julian won’t be safe until he lands in Australia. Please keep tracking his flight. #AssangeJethttps://t.co/N56dysEYPP https://t.co/UyUr5qesEm pic.twitter.com/0SmeloiyM7

— Stella Assange #FreeAssangeNOW (@Stella_Assange) June 25, 2024

After spending 1,901 days in Belmarsh maximum security prison in the United Kingdom, WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange reached a plea deal with the United States and is on his way to his native Australia.

The Department of Justice has filed a plea agreement in federal court in the Northern Mariana Islands, recommending a 62-month sentence for the Australian citizen. The 5 years Assange spent in Belmarsh will be credited towards his sentence and Assange will plead guilty to one count of the Espionage Act—“conspiracy to disseminate national defense information”—according to The New York Times.

WikiLeaks tweeted Tuesday night, “[Assange] was granted bail by the High Court in London and was released at Stansted airport during the afternoon, where he boarded a plane and departed the UK.”

Assange’s wife, Stella Assange, also tweeted about his release and has continued to update on the status of his flights and whereabouts.

Seth Stern, director of advocacy for Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF), issued a statement condemning the US government and Biden administration, stating:

It’s good news that the DOJ is putting an end to this embarrassing saga. But it’s alarming that the Biden administration felt the need to extract a guilty plea for the purported crime of obtaining and publishing government secrets. That’s what investigative journalists do every day.

The plea deal won’t have the precedential effect of a court ruling, but it will still hang over the heads of national security reporters for years to come. The deal doesn’t add any more prison time or punishment for Assange. It’s purely symbolic. The administration could’ve easily just dropped the case but chose to instead legitimize the criminalization of routine journalistic conduct and encourage future administrations to follow suit. And they made that choice knowing that Donald Trump would love nothing more than to find a way to throw journalists in jail.

Bruce Afran, a US Constitutional lawyer, told Consortium News that the plea deal does not create a legal precedent.

“A plea is not precedent. Precedent consists of a decision interpreting a matter of law by an appeals court that will govern future cases on the same legal principle. In contrast, a plea is merely a factual agreement by a given defendant that they did a certain act, but does not bind future defendants in similar cases.

For example, if Julian chooses to drop his first amendment defenses and plead guilty, this does not mean that a similar defendant in the future does not have a First Amendment defense in an espionage act case. No appeals court has decided such issues, and Julian‘s plea does not bind future courts or future parties nor will it ever be considered in any other defendant’s case.

There is a doctrine that a person is bound to a factual decision, including a plea, only if they participated in that case. This means that no future defendant will ever be impacted legally, either by fact or law, as a result of Julian’s guilty plea. It has no precedental value or effect.”

Below is the document filed in the US commonwealth islands as released by one of Assange’s lawyers, Aitor Martínez.