Julian Assange affidavit unsealed

An affidavit detailing the alleged crimes of Julian Assange was unsealed Monday, revealing more about what investigators knew regarding the WikiLeaks founder’s communications with former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning. Assange, 47, was arrested Thursday at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in connection to a charge in the U.S. of conspiring to hack into a Pentagon computer network in 2010. A possible arrest and extradition to the U.S. had been expected in recent months after prosecutors mistakenly revealed in November that the Justice Department had secretly filed criminal charges against Assange. Following a U.K. Supreme Court ruling that he should be extradited to Sweden for questioning over sexual assault charges, Assange sought and was granted political asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012. He remained there until metropolitan London police arrested him last week. The disclosure of a sealed indictment against Assange, which came during special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, led to speculation that it was related to WikiLeaks’ role in disseminating emails stolen from Democratic officials during the 2016 election. The U.S. intelligence community believes Russian hackers were behind the theft.

But the indictment, unsealed last week, revealed Assange had not been charged in connection with Russian interference in the election nor had he been charged for publishing government secrets contained in the documents leaked by Manning almost a decade ago. Instead, prosecutors charged him with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion by agreeing to help Manning crack a password that would have given her access to a classified military network. The single-count conspiracy indictment against Assange carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison, but national security experts speculate that there could be a slew of additional charges — including espionage — leveled at Assange if and when he is extradited to the United States.

FBI special agent Megan Brown wrote in the 26-page affidavit filed in December 2017 Assange and Manning allegedly tried to gain access to the Pentagon network, but “it remains unknown whether Manning and Assange were successful in cracking the password.”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/julian-assange-affidavit-unsealed

Assange Affidavit

https://www.scribd.com/document/406384145/Assange-Affidavit#from_embed

>>6193696

Posting this pick, because there is a bizzare reflection..on the window, that almost distorts Assange's hand..not sure if this has been examined.. Thinking it might be a good idea to check it out, nonetheless.

>>6193696

>>6193769

Opps! here it it is

A brand too dirty to trademark — or for Supreme Court justices to say aloud

One of the most versatile profanities in the English language took center stage at the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday. But the nine members of the court and the attorneys arguing the case managed to avoid saying the word — or the company name, FUCT, that is its phonetic equivalent — aloud during an hourlong conversation about whether to strike down a federal trademark law that lets the government refuse to register marks deemed immoral or scandalous. The measure was the basis for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's rejection of Erik Brunetti's 2011 application to register his clothing brand's name, a move later upheld by the office's Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.

Afterward, Brunetti took his case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which found the federal government correctly deemed the mark (pronounced like the word "fucked") scandalous but said the law in question violates the Constitution's protection of freedom of speech. In lieu of referring to Brunetti's clothing brand directly, Supreme Court justices and attorneys alike opted for euphemistic references on Monday or spoke broadly about profanities and sexually explicit material. Malcolm Stewart, a lawyer with the Justice Department arguing for the Trump administration, referred to FUCT as the “equivalent of the profane past participle form of a well-known word of profanity and perhaps the paradigmatic word of profanity in our language.” Chief Justice John Roberts, meanwhile, called it “the vulgar word at the heart of the case.” But the motivation behind the name FUCT was not lost on at least some of the justices. “Come on, be serious,” Justice Samuel Alito told John Sommer, who argued the case on behalf of Brunetti. “You know what he’s trying to say.”

The court seemed divided as to whether the provision at issue, which has been on the books for more than a century, violated Brunetti’s free speech rights. Justice Stephen Breyer seemed particularly concerned a ruling in Brunetti’s favor would open the door for trademarks featuring racial slurs, which could then be displayed on advertisements on buses or newsstands. “Very often, the word involved in your case and the racial slur is not viewpoint,” Breyer said. “It is used to insult somebody, rather like fighting words, or it’s used to call attention to yourself.”

But others on the nine-member court acknowledged the law was broad and applied inconsistently by the Patent and Trademark Office. Some trademark applications, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said, were turned down on dual grounds: because the marks were scandalous as well as because they resemble marks that are already registered. “If the mark is already registered,” Ginsburg said, “then it’s not scandalous.”

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, for example, declined to register FUCT but allowed FCUK, an acronym for the U.K.-based clothing chain French Connection. How, Justice Neil Gorsuch asked, is a “reasonable citizen” supposed to know how the government will treat their mark? “Is it a flip of a coin?” he asked.

The wording of the statute is “very broad,” said Justice Elena Kagan, who suggested the dilemma could be addressed legislatively. “If Congress wants to pass a statute that’s narrower, that’s focused on vulgarity or profanity, then Congress can do that,” she said.

The Trump administration argues that in refusing to approve trademark applications with scandalous or immoral material, the government is “protecting unwilling viewers from material that they find offensive.” A ruling from the justices is expected by the end of June.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/a-brand-too-dirty-to-trademark-or-for-supreme-court-justices-to-say-aloud

>>6194025

Thanks…It wasn't as easy for me to see..glad to hear:)

Michelle Obama Rips Trump: ‘Divorced Dad’ Who’s Making America ‘Sick

Former First Lady Michelle Obama bashed President Donald Trump in London on Sunday, reportedly comparing Trump to a “divorced dad” who is making America “sick.”

“We come from a broken family, we are a little unsettled,” Obama reportedly told Stephen Colbert while promoting her bestselling memoir, Becoming, before a crowd of about 15,000. “Sometimes you spend the weekend with divorced dad. That feels like fun but then you get sick. That is what America is going through. We are living with divorced dad.” Obama also reportedly implied that Trump was never prepared to be president, saying the presidency reveals who someone truly is. “We were always ourselves – the presidency does not change who you are, it reveals who you are,” Obama reportedly said in what the Independent said “appeared to be another dig” at Trump. “It is like swimming in the ocean with great waves. If you are not a great swimmer, you are not going to learn in the middle of a tidal wave. You are going to resort to your kicking and drowning and what you knew how to do in the pool.”

Obama also said America is currently in a “dark” place and there is “trepidation” and “anxiety” in America and all over the world because of Trump’s presidency. “This may feel like a dark chapter but any story has its highs and lows but it continues. Yes, we are in a low but we have been lower. We have had tougher times, we have had more to fear. We have lived through slavery, the Holocaust and segregation,” she reportedly added. “We have always come out at the other end – better and stronger. We are moving in a direction of diversity and inclusion. No one ever said it would be easy. We are just in the throes of the uneasy path of change.”

Obama revealed in her memoir that she will “never forgive” Trump for fanning the birther controversy, and she again criticized Trump for questioning her husband’s place of birth and calling for his transcripts while saying her critics accused her of being an unpatriotic person who was “loud and rude and obnoxious.” “I don’t know if there has been a president who has been accused of not being born in this country? Who has been asked to show his transcripts? Who has been accused of being unpatriotic? There was a lot of stuff that had not happened before that happened to us,” Obama reportedly said. “There was a time when people accused me of not loving my country. They accused me of being loud and rude and obnoxious.”

Obama, who told Oprah Winfrey that she cried for 30 minutes after Trump’s inauguration, then told the audience that they should take some “solace” in the fact that her husband was elected twice and, in her opinion, would have been elected for a third term had he been eligible. “That really did happen. People would have voted for him for a third time. What is going on today is true but what happened before was also true. That should give us some solace at some level,” Obama said. “For eight years, the president they saw in their country was Barack Obama. He was somebody who people thought was smart and would do the right thing.” Michelle Obama’s memoir has sold more than 10 million copies, and her publisher said it “could well become the most successful memoir ever.”

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/04/15/michelle-obama-rips-trump-divorced-dad-whos-making-america-sick/