WikiLeaks to Obama: Pardon Manning, Snowden

WikiLeaks is urging President Obama to pardon whistleblowers Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden before President-elect Donald Trump takes office.

The pro-transparency organization tweeted Friday that Obama has a “political moment” to pardon the pair.

President Obama has a political moment to pardon Manning & Snowden. If not, he hands a Trump presidency the freedom to take his prize.

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) November 11, 2016

WikiLeaks has long argued Manning and Snowden deserve clemency for leaking sensitive national intelligence to the public.

The transparency organization’s calls have new urgency, however, following Trump’s surprise win this week over his presidential rival Hillary Clinton.

Obama has cut short sentences for 944 people during his presidency – more than the last 11 presidents combined – with 760 receiving commutations in 2016 alone.

But most of those pardons have gone for people sentenced for nonviolent drug crimes, not those sentenced for leaking intelligence information.

Manning, a transgender woman formerly known as Bradley Manning, is a former Army soldier who was court-martialed in July 2013 for leaking troves of sensitive diplomatic and military documents to WikiLeaks.

Manning has since been dishonorably discharged from her military position and is serving a 35-year prison sentence.

Snowden, meanwhile, leaked classified information about the National Security Agency (NSA) in 2013, exposing numerous covert global surveillance programs.

The former NSA contractor now resides in an undisclosed location in Russia as part of an exile since leaking the information.