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Former White House national security official Fiona Hill said former President Trump was “not particularly interested” in freeing ex-Marine Paul Whelan from Russian prison, where he is detained over accusations of espionage that he denies.
“At the particular time, I also have to say here that President Trump wasn’t especially interested in engaging in that swap for also Paul Whelan. He was not particularly interested in Paul’s case in the way that one would have thought he would be,” Hill said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” with Margaret Brennan.
The Biden White House announced last week that it had facilitated a prisoner swap with Russia to secure the release of WNBA star Brittney Griner after she’d been held for nearly 10 months and sent to a penal colony for a drug possession conviction.
The administration traded Griner in a one-for-one prisoner swap for Viktor Bout, an arms dealer sentenced for trafficking weapons and conspiring to kill Americans. The move was celebrated by some but criticized by a number of Republicans who highlighted that Whelan has been detained in Russia for more than four years.
