The potential return of former President Donald Trump to the Oval Office was reportedly a key factor in the prisoner exchange with Russia, which resulted in the liberation of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and others.
This revelation underscores the influence of Trump's assertive foreign policy approach, even after his presidency.
According to the Wall Street Journal, a German official involved in the negotiations with Russia leveraged the possibility of Trump's return to the presidency to pressure Moscow into releasing the prisoners. The German team, led by Wolff, found an opportunity when their Russian counterparts expressed a desire to finalize the deal before the U.S. election in November. This led some officials to infer that the Russians were either apprehensive about the unpredictability of a Trump second term or concerned that Scholz, the German Chancellor, might be less cooperative with a President known for his criticism of Germany.
"We then decided to push it to the limit," a senior official involved in the talks revealed. The Germans, during a meeting in Saudi Arabia in early spring, indicated their willingness to release Krasikov, a Russian prisoner. However, they warned the Russians that the cost would be significantly higher than previously discussed. They removed the main hurdle that had stalled the talks: the one-for-one rule, which stipulated that Krasikov could only be exchanged for one other prisoner.
"We made it clear: We are ready but only if the price is right," a senior official involved in the negotiations stated.
As reported by RedState, the negotiations were so protracted that Russia began imprisoning Germans. By the final stages of the talks, approximately 30 German citizens were detained by Russia and its ally, Belarus. Initially, Scholz resisted engaging in hostage diplomacy. However, after a German was sentenced to death in Belarus, this strategy became untenable. He instructed his envoys to include four Germans on the release list.
Earlier this year, Trump confidently asserted that he would have been successful in securing Gershkovich's release if he were reelected. "The reporter should be released, and he will be released," Trump declared during an interview with TIME. "I dont know if hes going to be released under Biden. I would get him released."
In another interview, Trump commended the outcome but suggested he could have achieved a better deal. Speaking with FOX Business host Maria Bartiromo, Trump labeled the deal that secured the return of Gershkovich and others a "win" for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"As usual, it was a win for Putin or any other country that deals with us, but we got somebody back, so I'm never going to be challenging that," he told Bartiromo. "It wouldn't have happened with us. We would have gotten him back. We wouldn't have had to pay anything. We wouldn't have had to let some of the great killers of the world go, because that's what's happened, as you know. And the deal is very complex because it just came out. So nobody understands the deal yet, and they make it complex so you can't understand how bad the deal is for us."
Gershkovich's release was part of a significant prisoner exchange involving up to 30 individuals, as reported by RedStates Streiff. Russia released both Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan in a major prisoner swap. Both had been imprisoned on espionage charges, with Whelan in Russian custody since January 2019 and Gershkovich since March 2023. Whelan was serving a 20-year sentence, and Gershkovich had recently been sentenced to 16 years.
The deal reportedly involves at least 24 prisoners and potentially as many as 30. If these numbers are accurate, this could be the largest prisoner swap since the return of U.S. prisoners of war from Vietnam.
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