The father and brother of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange spoke out on Wednesday about his ongoing imprisonment in the United Kingdom
In a segment of “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” John and Gabriel Shipton maintained Assange’s innocence and talked about the conditions he is facing in a maximum security prison as he awaits a ruling in his extradition case.
“This is a sincere question, what did your son do wrong exactly? What is his specific crime?,” Fox News host and Daily Caller co-founder Tucker Carlson asked Shipton.
“Well, no specific crime at all, Tucker,” he responded, “He’s just offended some people in certain sections of Washington and consequently has faced 12 years now of persecution and harassment. Julian, as you know, is not an American citizen yet. He’s been tried under the 1917 Espionage Act to bring Julian to the United States under the threat of 175 years in jail. Nothing at all, just embarrassed a few people.”
Carlson then asked Assange’s brother, Gabriel, about Assange’s life in prison and whether or not he’s allowed to have visitors.
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“He’s in Belmarsh prison. I visited him in October last year and since then, he has had no visits. The prison is in total lockdown due to Covid so he has had no visitors from any family or his lawyers,” Gabriel said, “It’s a maximum security prison, so it has all the most dangerous prisoners from around the U.K., the most violent prisoners, and he has been there up on three years now.”
“He won his extradition case on January 4th and then the U.S. government appealed and a couple days later he was refused bail so he’s been in since January, he’s been sitting in prison. He’s an innocent man not able to see his family or lawyers and we just don’t know when the appeal will happen or when this will end,” Shipton added while choking up.(RELATED: Australia Prime Minister Scott Morrison Says Country Will Welcome Back Julian Assange If He Beats Extradition)
The segment ended with Gabriel responding to a question from Carlson about if any elected officials have stood up for Assange and his family.
“Not since Biden’s inauguration, not since President Biden’s inauguration, 25th of January, we haven’t had — it’s been silent from people in Congress and the Senate, which is part of the reason why we are doing this, is to encourage Americans to stand up for their First Amendment rights.”
U.S. prosecutors have indicted Assange, a native Australian, on 17 charges of espionage and one charge of computer misuse for WikiLeaks’ 2010 release of thousands of U.S. diplomatic and military documents from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
A London judge in January denied bail for the Wikileaks founder, forcing him to stay in prison while courts in the U.K. deliberate on whether he will be sent to the U.S. to face the charges.