This booking photo provided by the Alexandria Sheriffs Office, in Virginia, shows Chelsea Manning. On Friday, March 8, 2019, Manning, who served years in prison for leaking one of the largest troves of classified documents in U.S. history, was sent to jail for refusing to testify before a grand jury investigating Wikileaks.Photo: AP / Alexandria, Va. Sheriffs Office

Chelsea Manning is not accused of committing any new crime. But she is now a prisoner of the U.S. government once again and may remain one for up to 18 months.

After resisting questions by prosecutors during a secret hearing related to crimes for which she already served seven years in military prison, Manning was ordered into custody on Friday by U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton and told she would remain there until she purges.

Manning, whose right to remain silent was supplanted as part of the grand jury process, was subpoenaed last month in the U.S. Justice Departments not-so-sealed investigation into Julian Assange. Her defiance of this secret inquisition, however, is not about protecting the WikiLeaks founder at all.

Manning says she is resisting because she, like many other politically minded Americans, believes grand juries are an illegal instrument designed to aide prosecutors on fishing expeditions; a tool for stripping witnesses of their constitutional rights that has been historically used against peaceful political activists by men in power who would have them labelled terrorists and enemies of the state.

By resisting this grand jury, Chelsea has made the same sacrifice as dozens of activists before her, who have opposed the grand jury system at the expense of their own freedom, her support committee said in a statement. Chelsea has already served prison time for standing up against government secrecy and revealing war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. We know, and so does the government, that she will not turn tail and allow this shadowy grand jury to eclipse her legacy of speaking truth to power.

Legally speaking, Mannings imprisonment is not punitive; it is not considered a form of punishment for something she has done. Her incarceration farther is designed to be coercive; it is intended to break her, to force her to submit. By depriving Manning of her freedom, prosecutors hope that shell crave its return hard enough to spill her guts.

Ironically, she already has.

Mannings association with WikiLeaks nearly a decade ago was dissected in exhaustive detail during her 2013 court-martial, in which all manner of evidence about her brief contact with WikiLeaks, including the transcripts of their conversations, was presented. But now she is meant to regurgitate that story based on her own flawed memories while under the threat of prolonged incarceration if she finds any reason to refuse.

We hope she changes her mind now, the prosecutor, Tracy McCormick, told the Associated Press.

Although Manning is constitutionally protected from double jeopardyfrom being charged twice for the same crimeher political right to silence has effectively been stripped away. Americans right to remain silent is viewed, in the case of grand jury proceedings, as an obstacle that can be legally overcome. A half-century ago, Congress agreed and provided prosecutors a tool to do just that.

Immunity is not voluntary for Manning. It is thrust upon witnesses like her for one purpose only: to negate their privilege against self-incrimination granted under the Fifth Amendment.

Grand juries, comprised of 16-23 individuals, are not screened for personal biases as they would be during the voir dire processof a normal trial. There is no judge present; there are no defense attorney; there are no rules of evidence. Indictments may be issued with the support of a dozen jurors whove been bombarded by hearsay. They can not only issue indictments, but grant prosecutors the power to invade the private lives of citizens, acquire their personal records and communications, and coerce them into cooperating with the government under threat of confinement, whether theyre guilty of a crime or not.

It is for these reasons that Manning, an activist, says she is refusing to submit. I will not participate in a secret process that I morally object to, particularly one that has been historically used to entrap and persecute activists for protected political speech, she said in a statement.

It is no secret that members of the current administration have openly expressed their hatred for Chelsea, her supporters said. Donald Trump himself has tweeted about his desire to undo Barack Obamas commutation and put Chelsea back in jail. We reject the logic that Chelsea should comply and answer questions regarding events for which she has already provided ample testimony, and we condemn the governments punitive efforts to back her into a corner.

The nature of the charges the government hopes to bring against Assange remain a mystery. Anonymous officials have told reporters the case is unrelated to the 2016 election, and the attempt to compel testimony from Manning would appear to support that, at least in part.

It is likely that the government has considered ways to avoid a messy First Amendment battle that pits their own perception of Assanges publication as a tool for espionage against the passionate feelings jurors may have about freedom of the press. Charges under the Espionage Act, the limits of which have not been fully tested in court, present numerous obstacles in this regard. Notably, the courts have found specific intent to be a prerequisite of an espionage conviction.

The government would need to show, in other words, that not only was Assange aware that publishing classified U.S. government documents would do harm to the United States, theyd need to prove that harming the United Statesand not merely shedding light on its controversial political practices and military actionswas itself specifically his goal all along.

Late last year, the U.S. government accidentally revealed that a sealed complaint had been filed

It is far more likely, given Mannings involvement now, that the government is searching for ways to avoid this espionage dilemma entirely; to not have their prosecutors positioned opposite the First Amendment in a trial thats sure to become a massive public spectacle.

As Gizmodo previously reported, there is at least some evidence that Assange has cooperated with convicted criminal hackers in the past in ways that may have left him vulnerable to accessory charges in years-old computer crimesif only after-the-fact.

Regardless of his cases outcome, Texas journalist Barrett Brown was at least initially charged after merely sharing a hyperlink to data stolen during the 2011 hack of Stratfor, a private intelligence firm. WikiLeaks, on the other hand, shared with those same hackers actual code designed to aide them in riffling through roughly 5 million emails pilfered from Stratfor. Whats more, other reports suggest WikiLeaks may have also solicited cyberattacks against a U.S. ally abroad, which was definitely a branch of DOJs long-running investigation into the organization, as evident by the involvement of FBI agents and informants.

The courts decision to imprison Chelsea Manning for refusing to comply with a grand jury is pointless, punitive, and cruel, her supporters said Friday.

Chelsea has clearly stated her moral objection to the secretive and oppressive grand jury process. We are Chelseas friends and fellow organizers, and we know her as a person who is fully committed to her principles. If Judge Claude M. Hilton and [assistant U.S. attorney] Gordon Kromberg believe that subjecting Chelsea to more punishment will change her mind, they are gravely mistaken.

To quote Chelsea, they added, we got this.

Continued here:
Why Chelsea Manning Decided to Go to Jail in Protest

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April 22, 2019, 3:37 PM UTC

By Associated Press

RICHMOND, Va. A federal appeals court has rejected a bid by former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to be released from jail for refusing to testify to a grand jury.

The unanimous decision issued Monday by the appellate court in Richmond rejects both Manning's argument that she was erroneously found in civil contempt and her request for bail while the contempt decision is litigated.

Manning has been jailed at the Alexandria Detention Center since March 8 after refusing to testify to a grand jury investigating Wikileaks.

Since her incarceration, criminal charges against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange have been unsealed and U.S. officials have requested his extradition. Manning's lawyers argued that her testimony is unnecessary since Assange has already been charged.

Manning served seven years in a military prison for leaking a trove of documents to Wikileaks.

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Appeals court rejects Chelsea Manning's effort to leave jail

It's been a little more than nine years since Chelsea Manning first contacted Wikileaks and provided Julian Assange's organization with hundreds of thousands of classified documents and a video of an Apache helicopter strike that killed Iraqi insurgents and two photographers working for Reuters.

Their life stories have been intertwined since the pair first contacted each other over the internet, but they have never met in person.

The story of how Manning and Assange began their relationship is laid out in great detail in the 35-page statement Manning read on Feb. 28, 2013 when she pleaded guilty. Assange's federal indictment released Thursday essentially lays out another layer of the cooperation between Manning and Assange that was not described in her guilty statement.

According to the newly unsealed indictment made public on Thursday, in early March 2010, Assange agreed to help Manning, an Army intelligence analyst, with cracking an administrative password to the military's classified internet system. Getting access to the password would have made it harder for investigators to track Manning as the source of the information being posted by Wikileaks.

None of this was mentioned in Manning's 2013 guilty plea statement though the password request was mentioned during the pre-trial hearings that preceded Manning's court-martial.

Manning's guilty plea statement also presented a narrative of how she came to contact Wilkileaks and eventually Assange.

In late 2009, Manning was a disillusioned Army private first class serving in Baghdad. Her secure work computer gave her access to files detailing the U.S. military's operations in the Middle East region including hundreds of thousands of battlefields reports known as "SigActs," or significant action reports, filed by U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq that contained descriptions of mundane military events and firefights.

Manning decided to download the SigActs and during a two-week leave back in the U.S. in late 2009 decided that news organizations needed to see what were in the battlefield reports. In her statement Manning described unsuccessfully trying to get the attention of The New York Times and The Washington Post. After perceiving little interest , though it's not clear Manning spoke to anyone of significance at each paper, the Army private first class decided to contact Wikileaks, an organization that had gained her attention.

Before returning to Iraq, Manning uploaded hundreds of thousands of SigActs to a Wikileaks dropsite, but never heard back. In the statement, Manning described becoming interested in classified State Department diplomatic cables about Iceland and again uploaded to the site. Within hours, the document was posted on the website. It was the first time Manning figured out that Wikileaks must have received the SigActs she had previously sent the organization. Manning then decided to send Wikileaks the Apache video she had come across after a work colleague mentioned its existence.

It was after the posting of that video that Manning was contacted by someone at Wikileaks who went by the name of "Nathaniel" and that was who Manning suspected was Assange. They began an almost daily correspondence over the Jabber networking site.

In March and April 2010, Manning sent Wikileaks 250,000 diplomatic cables, a video of an airstrike in Afghanistan killed civilians and hundreds of assessments about the detainees being held at Guantanamo.

In all, Manning provided Wikileaks with 400,000 Iraq SigAct reports, 90,000 Afghanistan SigAct reports, 250,000 State Department cables and 800 Guantanamo detainee assessment briefs.

Following the guilty plea, Manning was sentenced to 35 years in jail, but her sentence was later commuted by President Barack Obama to seven years.

Since early March, Manning has been held at a jail in Virginia for refusing to testify to a federal grand jury that was investigating Wikileaks.

In a statement issued Thursday, Manning's legal team said the newly unsealed charges against Assange support the view that Manning should not be in jail.

"The indictment against Julian Assange unsealed today was obtained a year to the day before Chelsea appeared before the grand jury and refused to give testimony," the statement said.

"Compelling Chelsea to testify would have been duplicative of evidence already in the possession of the grand jury, and was not needed in order for US Attorneys to obtain an indictment of Mr Assange," the legal team argued. "Since her testimony can no longer contribute to a grand jury investigation, Chelsea's ongoing detention can no longer be seriously alleged to constitute an attempt to coerce her testimony. As continued detention would be purely punitive, we demand Chelsea be released."

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How Julian Assange and Chelsea Manning became intertwined

As soon as the indictment against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was unsealed today by the Justice Department, Chelsea Manning's name was trending, too.

On Thursday, Assange was dramatically removed from the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he has been living since 2012, by British authorities "on behalf of the United States, according to Londons Metropolitan Police, after Ecuador decided to rescind his asylum. A few hours later, an unsealed indictment filed by the Justice Department revealed that the U.S. sought to extradite Assange to face one count of conspiracy to commit computer intrusionthe conspiracy, court filings now publicly allege, was with Manning.

According to the indictment, Assange allegedly agreed to help Manning "crack a password that would provide access to Defense Department network used to store classified documents and communications," as described by Gizmodo, during the period in which she was disclosing classified government documents to Wikileaks as a U.S. Army intelligence analyst in 2010. The charge of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion carries only up to five years in prison; reports say Assange fears that he will be charged with additional (and much more serious) counts of espionage related to other disclosures when he reaches U.S. soil.

But it is Chelsea Manning who has already been in the custody of authorities for over a month. On March 8, Manning was held in contempt of court for refusing to answer questions in front of a federal grand jury in a sealed case, what today's indictment now seems to show is that of the government's against Assange. Prosecutors likely wanted to compel Manning to testify to their online conversations; when she refused to answer any of their questions, citing the lack of transparency in grand jury proceedings, which occur behind closed doors, she was detained, first in what her team said was solitary confinement (called "administrative segregation" by the Truesdale Detention Center) for 28 days, and now in general population.

In a statement they released earlier today, Manning's lawyers argue that the indictment "strengthens their claims of grand jury abuse." They say that the fact that it was obtained more than a year ago shows that prosecutors wanted Manning to testify to information she had already extensively detailed in her 2013 court martial proceedingsbefore she was sentenced to 35 years in prison, serving sevenand that her testimony was not needed to obtain an indictment of Assange. Therefore, because any evidence Manning could give "can no longer contribute to a grand jury investigation, Chelseas ongoing detention can no longer be seriously alleged to constitute an attempt to coerce her testimony," and is "purely punitive."

Janus Rose, a friend and representative of Manning's support committee Chelsea Resists in communication with her legal team, told Vogue that Manning's "continued imprisonment is detrimental to her health." Though Manning's move from "administrative congregation" to general population on April 4th has made it easier to communicate with her, the trauma of adapting back to civilian life after her sentence was commuted by former President Barack Obama in 2017 only to be detained again is taking its toll. The last time Rose spoke to Manning, when Manning returned to general population, she seemed "disoriented," though she is "tough as hell."

In isolation, where she was confined for 22 hours a day, Manning, who is working on a book, could only keep pen and paper in her cellshe could make phone calls, read letters, and complete daily hygiene tasks between the hours of 1am and 3am according to Rose. (Dana Lawhorne, the Alexandria, VA sheriff has refuted the characterization of Manning's condition as "solitary," saying, Our facility does not have solitary confinement and inmates housed in administrative segregation for safety and security reasons still have access to social visits, books, recreation, and break time outside their cells.") The letters from supporters in particular have been helpful, Rose says, "because the entire carceral system is designed to isolate and break the spirit."

Manning and her lawyers are in touch on today's developments regarding Assange's indictment, Rose confirmed; they have already announced that they will be filing a reply brief in their appeal asking that the contempt finding be vacated. "The only real way this will stop disrupting her life," Rose says, "is for her to be set free and left alone."

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Chelsea Manning's "Continued Imprisonment Is Detrimental ...

Chelsea Manning in front of the U.S. District Courthouse in Alexandria, Va., in March before she was jailed. (NBC News screenshot)

Chelsea Manning, the Army whistleblower who released hundreds of thousands of pages of classified documents to Wikileaks in 2011 and who called attention to war crimes committed by U.S. troops, is back in jail. In fact, shes been there for a monthnot that the mainstream media cares. Whats another whistleblower locked up?

But Manning isnt being held in the federal lockup in Alexandria, Virginia, for providing classified information to the media. She was already sentenced to 35 years in a military prison for that. (She served seven years before President Barack Obama commuted her sentence.) This time, shes been thrown behind bars for an indeterminate period of incarceration because she refused to testify before the Wikileaks grand jury. And to make matters worse, she was reportedly held in solitary confinement (or, as sheriff Dana Lawhorne called it, administrative segregation) until April 5.

While the hive media has been all but silent, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at least spoke out in support of Manning last week, calling her jail conditions torture.

What Manning is doing, in my view, is heroic for myriad reasons.There is no need to rehash what shethen Private First Class Bradley Manningdid in 2011. You dont have to like Chelsea to acknowledge that shes a whistleblower. Theres a legal definition of whistleblowing. It is bringing to light any evidence of waste, fraud, abuse, illegality, or threats to the public health or safety. Thats exactly what she did when she downloaded and delivered to Wikileaks thousands of pages of government documents that exposed the real truth about the American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The most damning of these for the government weretheCollateral Murder video, the Afghanistan war logs, the Iraq war logs, and the Guantanamo files.

But the price that she has paid has been very high. Manning spent two of her seven years in prison in solitary confinement, a situation the United Nations has characterized as a form of torture. She twice attempted suicide the first time she was in solitary. And she was forced to remain naked for a year in solitary because she was a suicide risk. Authorities were afraid she would use her clothes to hang herself.

In early March, Manning was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury in the federal court for the Eastern District of Virginia. The media reported that the Justice Departments prosecutors wanted her to testify about her relationship with Wikileaks co-founder Julian Assange and how she was able to pass classified documents to him in 2011. Manning contended that she had already testified to those questions in her own trial in 2012, and that all the feds had to do was enter into the record the transcript of her trial.

The feds wouldnt relent. But neither would Manning. She said she would invoke her FifthAmendment right against self-incrimination. Then the government offered her qualified immunity. Nothing she said before the grand jury would be used against her. (Except if she contradicted her 2011 testimony. Thats a trick the feds love to use to charge people with perjury or with making a false statement. More on that in a minute.) Manning held firm, however. Even with the qualified immunity offer, she said that she would invoke her First Amendment right to freedom of speech, her FourthAmendment right against illegal search and seizure, and her SixthAmendment right to due process. She wouldnt budge, and the Justice Department asked the judge to hold her indefinitely in contempt of court. That is how Manning found herself behind bars again.

When Manning was arrested and charged with contempt of court, I tweeted:

I said thisand I believe every word of itbecause Mannings actions remind me of those of folk singer and legendary activist Pete Seeger, a personal hero of mine.

Pete Seeger was a member of the Communist Party USA from the early 1940s until 1949, when he split with the party over Josef Stalins atrocities. Still, he remained friendly with many party members. In 1955, Seeger, along with folksingers and members of his band The WeaversLee Hayes, Mil Lampell, and Ronnie Gilbertwere subpoenaed to testify before the notorious House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), where they were asked to name names. Hayes, Lampell, and Gilbert all pleaded the Fifthso as not to incriminate themselves. They urged Seeger to do the same. But he did not.

Instead, Seeger went before the HUAC and refused to answer any questions, citing his constitutional rights under the First Amendment. He told the Committee, I am not going to answer any questions as to my associations, my philosophical or religious beliefs, or my political beliefs, or how I voted in any election, or any of these private affairs. I think these are very improper questions for any American to be asked, especially under such compulsion as this.

Seeger was charged with 10 felony counts of contempt of Congresssimilar to Mannings charge of contempt of courtconvicted, and sentenced to 10 concurrent one-year terms in a federal prison. The conviction was overturned a year later on a technicality.

Like Manning, Seeger could have taken the easy way out. But he didnt. He could have just taken the Fifth. He could have answered each question with I dont recall. But he chose to make a political point, to take a stand. That was courageous in 1955 and it is courageous in 2019.

Seeger got caught up in the anti-communist hysteria of the 1950s. The situation for Manning, though, is more sinister. Contrary to popular belief, President Obama did not pardon Manning in the final days of his administration. Instead, he commuted her sentence, simply releasing her from prison. The conviction still stands and Manning is still in legal jeopardy. Prosecutors could still decide to charge her with crimes related to the original charges. With that said, was Mannings subpoena a ham-fisted attempt to get her to contradict herself in new testimony, thus inviting another felony charge for perjury or making a false statement? Were prosecutors trying to get Manning to implicate herself in some process felony? Or were they simply trying to force her to turn rat on Julian Assange?

Again, Manning could have simply answered each question with I dont recall. She would have been home in time for dinner. Instead, she made a political pointone that all of us should want to emulate. That point is Dont tread on me. That point is Im willing to jeopardize my freedom to protect yours.

I say often that in my time at the CIA, I learned that CIA culture is such that employees are taught that everything in life is a shade of gray. But that is simply not true. Some things are black and white, right or wrong. This is one of those things. Its the government thats the enemy here, not Manning or Assange.

Remember, the American people own the information that Manning and Assange are accused of releasing. We have a right to know what our government is doing in our name. We have a right to know whether the government is covering up crimes. We have a right to know whenand whythose Americans who commit war crimes or crimes against humanity are not being prosecuted. The mainstream media doesnt tell us. But Wikileaks does.

We wouldnt know about some of the most egregious war crimes of the past two decades without Chelsea Manning and Julian Assange. You dont have to like them. You dont have to share their politics. You dont have to want to go out and have a beer with them. But you do have to respect what theyve done.

John Kiriakou is a formerCIAanalystandcaseofficerand seniorinvestigatorfor theSenate Foreign Relations Committee. He served two years in prison (2013-15) for blowing the whistle on the CIAs torture program. He is currently an activist, a radio host, and the author of the recent bookThe Convenient Terrorist: Two Whistleblowers Stories of Torture, Terror, Secret Wars and CIA Lieswith Joseph Hickman.

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Chelsea Mannings Dont Tread on Me Moment | The American ...

In a last minute action, President Barack Obama significantly commuted the sentence of incarcerated whistleblower Chelsea Manning.

The outgoing administration had been under enormous pressure to grant Ms Manning clemency before President-elect Donald Trump takes office. She was included in a list of 209 commutations and 64 pardons.

Ms Manning, 29, had been serving a 35-year sentence in a prison in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, for leaking classified military and diplomatic documents.

From 15p 0.18 $0.18 USD 0.27 a day, more exclusives, analysis and extras.

She will be released on 17 May 2017.

Why was Chelsea Manning in prison?

Ms Manning was convicted of espionage and theft in July 2013 after leaking information obtained while serving as an intelligence analyst in the US Army in 2009. She was stationed at Forward Operating Base Hammer in Iraq, during which time she gained access to such classified information. Among the information that shocked Ms Manning was video depicting the US military killing unarmed civilians.

She passed along the information to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in 2010 after failed attempts to contact the Washington Post and the New York Times. Wikileaks released video in April 2010 showing a US helicopter gunning down civilians including a Reuters journalist in Iraq.

Soldiers could be heard in the video, titled Collateral Murder, ridiculing the victims.

The most alarming aspect of the video to me, however, was the seemingly delightful bloodlust the aerial weapons team, Ms Manning said in a statement read in court. They dehumanised the individuals they were engaging and seemed to not value human life by referring to them as dead bastards, and congratulating each other on the ability to kill in large numbers.

Ms Manning, who was then known as Bradley Manning, revealed she was behind the leaks to former hacker Adrian Lamo in an online forum, under the handle bradass87. Mr Lamo subsequently turned her into the Department of Defense.

The DoD arrested Ms Manning in May 2010.

Gender identity

A day after her 2013 sentencing, Ms Manning announced her transgender identity in a statement given to NBC.

As I transition into the next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me. I am Chelsea Manning. I am a female, she said. Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible. I hope that you will support me in this transition.

She petitioned the court to be legally referred to as Chelsea Manning. The court granted the petition in 2014, and began undergoing hormone therapy.

Failed appeals and subsequent suicide attempts

Ms Manning filed an appeal to her sentence in May 2016. In an unclassified portion of her 250-page appeal, Ms Manning rebuked her sentencing as harsh and unjust.

No whistleblower in American history has been sentenced this harshly, she said, adding that the 35-year sentence is perhaps the most unjust sentence in the history of the military justice system.

Lead counsel for the Chelsea Manning Legal Defence Team called for the full overturn of Ms Mannings punishment.

A war against whistleblowers is being waged in this country and this case represents how this country treats anyone who reveals even a single page of classified information, said attorney Nancy Hollander. We need brave individuals to hold the government accountable for its actions at home and abroad and we call upon this court to overturn the dangerous precedent of Chelsea Mannings excessive sentencing.

Ms Manning attempted suicide twice in 2016 following her rejected appeal. After the first attempt in July, she faced disciplinary action and was sentenced to further solitary confinement. In October, when placed in solitary, she attempted to kill herself once more.

Clemency

The White House made the announcement of Ms Mannings clemency Tuesday afternoon.

While the mercy the President has shown his 1,597 clemency recipients is remarkable, said White House counsel Neil Eggleston, we must remember that clemency is an extraordinary remedy, granted only after the President has concluded that a particular individual has demonstrated a readiness to make use of his or her second chance.

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Chelsea Manning: Why was the whistleblower who exposed some ...

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22:38 04.04.2019(updated 22:58 04.04.2019) Get short URL

Whistleblower and former US Army analyst Chelsea Manning has been moved out of de facto solitary confinement and joined the general population at the Virginia jail where she has been detained since March 6. She refused to testify before a grand jury for its investigation into document leaking website WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange.

The support crew that operates Manning's Twitter account while she remains injail tweeted Thursday that"After 28 days inso-called 'administrative segregation,'(solitary confinement)' Chelsea has finally been moved intogeneral population atTruesdale Detention Center," the Alexandria, Virginia, jail where she's been held sinceMarch 6.

The development comes onthe heels ofa Tuesday motion filed byManning tobe released, arguing Judge Claude M. Hilton hadn't followed proper procedure byrefusing toweigh inon her arguments againstdetention and that her continued jailing had become punitive.

Manning's Twitter acknowledged her continuing legal battle and asked supporters todonate toher legal fund.

The whistleblower spent nearly a year insolitary confinement from2010 to2011 while awaiting trial forstealing classified documents fromthe US Army and publishing them onWikiLeaks. Those documents, collectively termed "Collateral Murder," exposed US war crimes inIraq and Afghanistan. She was sentenced to35 years inprison, butUS President Barack Obama commuted her sentence toseven years ofconfinment ashe left office in2017; Manning was released that May.

UN Special Rapporteur onTorture Juan Mendez has described solitary confinement formore than15 days astantamount to "torture."

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Chelsea Manning Moved Out of Solitary Confinement After ...

This is a breaking story...

Chelsea Manning is out of solitary confinement, but she remains in prison after refusing to testify to a grand jury due to her concerns that the exercise is a "perjury trap."

In a statement posted on her official Twitter account Thursday afternoon, Manning's team announced that "After 28 days in so-called 'administrative segregation' (solitary confinement), Chelsea has finally been moved into general population at Truesdale Detention Center."

** UPDATE: After 28 days in so-called "administrative segregation" (solitary confinement), Chelsea has finally been moved into general population at Truesdale Detention Center

That's good news, though the fight isn't over for Manning.

"While this is a big win, there's still a road ahead to get her out of jail," the account said.

** Chelsea is extremely grateful for everyone's support. While this is a big win, there's still a road ahead to get her out of jail. Please donate to Chelsea's legal fund so her lawyers can continue to work on her appeal and bring her home: https://t.co/TCer2mkAka

Manning has been at the prison since March 8. AsCommon Dreamsreported at the time, the whistleblower said in a statement the day before her imprisonment that her testimony was irrelevant to the case and that the only reason for her involvement in the grand jury was likely to trap her in making inconsistent statements.

"I have nothing to contribute to this case, and I resent being forced to endanger myself by participating in this predatory practice," Manning said in her statement March 7.

Manning's release from solitary comes just two days after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) called the practice torture.

Related: Chelsea Manning has been trapped in solitary confinement for refusing to answer questions before a Grand Jury.

Solitary confinement is torture.

Chelsea is being tortured for whistleblowing, she should be released on bail, and we should ban extended solitary in the US. https://t.co/95ef4xYt3k

Supporters of Manning celebrated the news Thursday but continued their calls for Manning's full release from prison.

"She's still in prison though when she should be free, so please keep fighting for her," said Evan Greer,deputy director for Fight for the Future.

BREAKING! Chelsea Manning has been released from solitary confinement! Thank frickin god. She's still in prison though when she should be free, so please keep fighting for her and donating to her legal fund. And retweet to spread the word https://t.co/zxkpezWFhI

"Good news, but the fight isnt over yet!" said Bob Bland, co-chair of the Women's March.

Check back for possible updates...

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'Thank Frickin God': Chelsea Manning Released From Solitary ...

Chelsea Manning has been transferred to general jail population after a judge found her in contempt of court last month for refusing to go before a grand jury probing WikiLeaks, her representatives said Thursday.

The update on Manning came via her Twitter account, which appears to have been actively managed during her time behind bars.

CHELSEA MANNING IN CUSTODY AFTER REFUSING TO TESTIFY BEFORE FEDERAL GRAND JURY IN WIKILEAKS PROBE

After 28 days in so-called administrative segregation (solitary confinement), Chelsea has finally been moved into general population at Truesdale Detention Center, her account tweeted.

Her team went on to extend Mannings appreciationfor those who supported her and urged her followers to donate moneyso her legal team can keep working on her case.

CHELSEA MANNING SEEKS IMMEDIATE RELEASE FROM VIRGINIA JAIL

Chelsea is extremely grateful for everyone's support. While this is a big win, there's still a road ahead to get her out of jail, they tweeted. Please donate to Chelsea's legal fund so her lawyers can continue to work on her appeal and bring her home.

Manning, a former U.S. Army analyst, was taken into custody in March after she said in a hearing that she did not intend to testify before a federal grand jury. The judge ordered Manning to remain in jail until she testifies or until the grand jury concludes its work.

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Earlier this week, Mannings legal team filed a motion with a federal appeals court in Virginia, fighting for her to be released on bail while the judges jail order is appealed.

Manning previously served seven years in prison for leakingmilitary and diplomatic documents to WikiLeaks before then-President Obama commuted her sentence.

Fox News Ryan Gaydos and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Chelsea Manning moved out of solitary confinement after 4 ...

Chelsea Manning documentary XY Chelsea, which premieres at Tribeca and will air in the U.S. on Showtime in June, has been picked up for international sales by UK documentary specialist Dogwoof.

Produced by Pulse Films and executive-produced by Laura Poitras, director Tim Travers Hawkins feature is an intimate portrait of Manning after her initial release from military prison. The whistleblower and former soldier was convicted by court martial in July 2013 of violations of the Espionages Act and other offenses, after disclosing to WikiLeaks nearly 750,000 classified or sensitive military and diplomatic documents. The trans activist had her 35-year sentence in an all-male maximum security prison commuted by President Obama in 2017 but was sent back to prison this year for contempt of court.

Pic was co-financed by the BFI, Field of Vision and Topic Studio and was written by Mark Monroe, Tim Travers Hawkins, Enat Sidi and Andrea Scott. Producers are Julia Nottingham, Isabel Davis, Thomas Benski and Lucas Ochoa.

Executive producers are Laura Poitras, Charlotte Cook, Vinnie Malhotra, Mary Burke, Michael Bloom, Lisa Leingang, Sharon Chang, Christos V. Konstantakopoulos, Blaine Vess, Marisa Clifford and Ryan Harrington. UK release is planned for May 24 this year.

Director Hawkins said, I am thrilled that Dogwoof will be our partners in getting this film out into the world. XY Chelsea is a challenging documentary that speaks to many troubling phenomena of our times, yet is also raw, intimate and human-scale. I cannot wait for audiences to engage with it. When I started making the film my only access to Chelsea was through written diaries that she mailed to me, and recorded calls over the heavily-monitored prison line. As we announce the release of the film she is locked up once again, proving both the urgency of her story, and her strength and uncompromising rebelliousness.

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Chelsea Manning Film XY Chelsea Gets Dogwoof Deal Before ...