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Former President Donald Trump claimed on Sunday he turned down a deal that would have freed a former Marine in exchange for a notorious Russian arms dealer.
The ex-president took to his social media platform, Truth Social, over the weekend to slam his successor’s decision to free Viktor Bout in exchange for WNBA star Brittney Griner.
Trump said he denied a deal that would have freed Bout — who has been dubbed the Merchant of Death due to his weapons deals with a Columbian drug cartel and terror groups — in exchange for Paul Whelan, a former US Marine who is serving over a decade in a gulag on espionage charges American officials say are bogus.
Still, Trump insists he would have been able to get Whelan out of his prison sentence, and denied that Griner would have ever been arrested in Russia for smuggling marijuana pens into the country.
His comments, though, come as the Biden administration stresses it is working with its counterparts in the Kremlin to free Whelan, with National Security Council spokesman John Kirby saying the administration is ‘still negotiating’ his release.
Former President Donald Trump claimed on Sunday he turned down a deal that would have freed Paul Whelan, a former Marine, in exchange for a notorious Russian arms dealer
Whelan has been held at a Russian penal colony since December 2018, when he was arrested on a trip to Moscow and was accused of espionage
In his post on Truth Social over the weekend, Trump slammed the prisoner exchange for WNBA star Brittney Griner as ‘crazy and bad’
In his post on Sunday, Trump suggested it was not worth the security concerns to free the 56-year-old arms dealer in exchange for the former marine.
‘I wouldn’t have made the deal for a hundred people in exchange for someone that has killed untold numbers of people with his arms deals,’ the former president wrote as he claimed he turned down an option to free Whelan for Bout.
‘I would have gotten Paul out, however, just as I did with a record number of other hostages,’ he continued, noting: ‘The deal for Griner is crazy and bad.
‘The taking wouldn’t have even happened during my administration,’ he claimed, ‘but if it did, I would have gotten her out, fast!’
But others were quick to point out that when he was asked about Paul Whelan back in 2019, he simply told reporters: ‘We’re looking into that.’
The former president insisted he would have gotten Whelan out if he were in office
Trump also suggested Griner would never have been arrested under his presidency
Some people online were quick to point out that Trump would only say he was ‘looking into’ getting Whelan home when he was president in 2019
Whelan has been held at a Russian penal colony since December 2018, when he was arrested on a trip to Moscow. He was convicted two years later on spying charges and was sentenced to 16 years in a maximum security jail.
He has since lost about 20 percent of his body weight, his brother, David, revealed in an interview with Good Morning America on Friday, as his family continues to worry about his mental and physical health.
Meanwhile, Griner was just arrested in February, after authorities accused her of carrying drugs – specifically marijuana oil – in her luggage at a Moscow airport.
She later confessed to the crime, in an apparent effort to seek a lighter sentence.
But after less than one year in Russian prisons, Griner arrived back in the U.S. on Friday, December 9.
Griner arrived back in the U.S. on Friday, December 9 after serving less than a year in a Russian prison for bringing marijuana products into the country
Critics have since been tearing into the White House for trading the notorious arms dealer for a women’s basketball star – rather than seeking the release of Whelan.
Some Republicans have even suggested the president cares more about the celebrity than the US service member, who told CNN afterwards he is being held ‘hostage’ at the penal colony.
He pleaded for the White House to ‘do everything they could to get me home’ as he faces another 12 years in the gulag.
‘I am greatly disappointed that more has not been done to secure my release, especially as the four-year anniversary of my arrest is coming up,’ Whelan told the news outlet in a phone call.
‘I was arrested for a crime that never occurred. I don’t understand why I’m still sitting here,’ he said.
Whelan then went on to say he hoped Biden ‘would do everything they could to get me home, regardless of the price they might have to pay at this point.’
Whelan, pictured here waiting for his verdict in 2020, said he was ‘disappointed’ more was not done to secure his release along with Griner’s
His remarks, though, came as it was revealed that Pentagon officials raised concerns with the Biden administration about freeing Bout.
They reportedly warned the president that Bout could return to dealing arms now that is back in his home country.
The so-called Merchant of Death was arrested in 2008 in Thailand and was convicted three years later for conspiring to kill Americans by selling tens of millions of dollars worth of weapons to FARC, a narco-terror group in Columbia.
He has also been tied with trying to sell arms to the Taliban and Al Qaeda, and was a former intelligence officer in the Soviet Union.
But Bout has repeatedly claimed to be a legitimate businessman, and has denied having anything to do with the Kremlin.
Viktor Bout was arrested in 2008 in Thailand and was convicted three years later for conspiring to kill Americans by selling tens of millions of dollars worth of weapons to FARC, a narco-terror group in Columbia
Bout was released as part of a prisoner exchange for Griner, despite apparent disapproval from the US Pentagon
Bout, a notorious arms dealer, is pictured with his wife upon his arrival back in Moscow late last week
Still, the prisoner exchange was widely mocked in Russia, with residents there claiming they got the better end of the deal.
‘The fact that Russia pushed through the exchange of Bout, whom America fundamentally did not want to give away for many years, right now means that, like in The Godfather, we ‘made them an offer that cannot be refused,” Maria Butina boasted in Russian on her Telegram channel.
‘This is a position of strength, comrades,’ added Butina, who was deported back to Russia in 2019 after serving an 18-month sentence in the US for acting as an unregistered foreign agent in the 2016 presidential election.
And in the aftermath of the deal, Russian President Vladimir Putin said he is willing to conduct more prisoner swaps with the United States in the future, signaling he, too, thought the country benefitted from the exchange.
‘We aren’t refusing to continue this work in the future,’ Putin said after Bout arrived home to a hero’s welcome in Moscow and Griner touched down in San Antonio, Texas, in the early hours of Friday morning.
He said ‘everything is on the table’ and pointed to ‘compromises’ found in the past.
‘This is the result of negotiations and the search for compromises. In this case, compromises were found and we aren’t refusing to continue this work in the future,’ Putin told reporters during a press conference in Kyrgyzstan Friday morning.
A senior White House official also told CNN on Friday they believe Moscow will keep negotiating a deal over Whelan because there are ‘things they want in this world.
‘We have shown an openness to talk about that which is actually available to us and gotten only in response a demand for something not available to us,’ the official said.
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