May 16, 2019

Chelsea Manning jailed again for refusing to testify to grand jury

Chelsea Manning addressing reporters outside a courthouse. Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images

U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning has been jailed again on civil contempt charges for refusing to cooperate with a grand jury subpoena on Thursday.

Details: Manning told reporters earlier on Thursday from in front of the courthouse that she'd rather remain in jail "forever," than testify before a grand jury on the details of Wikileaks.

"I’ve already been to prison, so attempting to coerce me with a grand jury subpoena is just not going to work ... The goal here is to re-litigate the court martial ... They didn't like the outcome, I got out. This is a way of placing me back into confinement."

— Chelsea Manning said at a press conference in Alexandria, Va.

The backdrop: In 2010, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange began publishing secret U.S. military and diplomatic documents — provided by the former Army intelligence analyst Manning. Manning has already spent 2 months in jail on a separate subpoena order, but was released earlier this month when the term of that grand jury lapsed. She previously served 7 years in a military prison for leaking documents to WikiLeaks before President Obama commuted what was left of her 35-year sentence.

The big picture: Federal prosecutors recently unsealed a classified indictment from late 2017 against Assange, who had been taking refuge in Ecuador’s embassy in London before his April arrest. Prosecutors in Northern Virginia charged Assange with conspiring to commit computer intrusion, citing his alleged agreement with Manning to crack an encoded passcode that would have allowed her to access a classified military network with another user’s profile.

Manning has stated that she does not agree with the forced secrecy of the grand jury process and claims that she already divulged everything she knows about WikiLeaks at her court-martial.

Go deeper ... Timeline: Julian Assange's 9-year legal limbo reaches its climax

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U.S. coronavirus updates: Death toll surpasses 14,800

Data: The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins; Map: Andrew Witherspoon/Axios

The novel coronavirus has now killed more than 2,000 people for the second day in a row, and it's infected more than 432,000 others, per Johns Hopkins data.

Where it stands: More than 14,800 people have died of COVID-19 in the U.S. — including over 4,500 in New York. The state's death toll surged to its highest one-day total on Wednesday — beating the previous day's record. 779 people died in New York in 24 hours. N.Y. has reported more cases than the most-affected countries in Europe.

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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is "stable, improving, sat up and engaged with medical staff" in the intensive care unit of London's St. Thomas' Hospital, where he is being treated for the coronavirus, Culture Minister Oliver Dowden told the BBC Thursday.

Zoom in: The update comes as ministers meet to discuss whether to extend the United Kingdom's lockdown and after the country's health officials reported Wednesday the highest daily rise in COVID-19 deaths — 938, taking the total to over 7,300. London Mayor said Wednesday the U.K. is "nowhere near lifting the lockdown," with the virus not expected to peak there until next week.

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Global: Total confirmed cases as of 3 a.m. ET: 1,484,811 — Total deaths: 88,538 — Total recoveries: 329,876 — Map.
U.S.: Total confirmed cases as of 3 a.m. ET: 432,132 — Total deaths: 14,817 — Total recoveries: 23,906 — Map.
Federal government latest: Top Trump administration officials had been developing a plan to give cloth masks to huge numbers of Americans, but the idea lost traction amid heavy internal skepticism.
States latest: New York has reported more cases than the most-affected countries in Europe. Chicago's Cook County jail is largest-known source of coronavirus in U.S.
Business: One-third of U.S. jobs are at risk of disappearing, mostly affecting low-income workers.
World: WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged countries to put politics aside "if you don’t want to have many more body bags.”
Environment: COVID-19 is underscoring the connection between air pollution and dire outcomes from respiratory diseases.
Tech: A new report recommends stimulus spending to help close the digital divide revealed by social distancing.
What should I do? Pets, moving and personal health — Answers about the virus from Axios experts — What to know about social distancing — Q&A: Minimizing your coronavirus risk.
Other resources: CDC on how to avoid the virus, what to do if you get it.

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