Chelsea Manning Has Yet to Speak with Ex-President Barack Obama
While Chelsea Manning, the transgender U.S. Army soldier convicted for leaking classified data, was already released from prison last month, she has yet to speak to former U.S. president Barack Obama, who granted her clemency.
Manning granted ABC's "Good Morning America" her first ever TV interview since her release from prison. In the said program, the former transgender soldier expressed how thankful she is to the former U.S. president for the clemency she granted her. After all, she was yearning to be given a second chance, and Obama did not deprive her of that chance.
"I was given a chance, that's all I wanted," Manning said on the show.
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To the uninitiated, Manning had been working as an intelligence analyst in Iraq. In 2013, she was convicted for espionage and other offenses after it was proven that she was responsible for the leak of more than 700,000 documents, videos and diplomatic cables to WikiLeaks.
In the same interview, Manning revealed that the reason behind her move to leak to the information she had was simply because she wanted to the spark public debate, and that she never thought her betrayal would threaten national security.
"I work with this information every day. I'm the subject matter expert for this stuff. You know, we're the ones who work with it the most. We're the most familiar with it. It's not, you know, it's not a general who writes this stuff," Manning said.
While Manning was originally sentenced to serve 35 years in prison, Obama made one surprising move just days before he left office in January: Grant Manning clemency. Hence, last month, Manning, who was originally known as Bradley Manning, finally regained her freedom.
"I hope to take the lessons that I have learned, the love that I have been given, and the hope that I have to work toward making life better for others," Manning said in an earlier statement prior to her release from prison.
