Brittney Griner's wife committed to 'getting every American home' during her White House press conference
- WNBA superstar Brittney Griner has been freed in a prisoner exchange between Russia and the US.
- Griner's wife, Cherelle, spoke alongside President Joe Biden in a press conference from the White House Thursday.
After nearly 10 months in Russian custody, the WNBA superstar has been released from a notorious penal colony in a prisoner swap between the White House and the Kremlin, President Biden confirmed Thursday morning. In conjunction with the State Department, he and his administration agreed to free Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout in exchange for Griner's safe return stateside.
But in a press conference from the White House shortly after news of Griner's homecoming broke, both Biden and the two-time Olympic gold medalist's wife, Cherelle, made a point to spotlight another wrongfully detained American who remains in Russian custody: Paul Whelan.
"BG is not here to say this, but I will gladly speak on her behalf and say that BG and I will remain committed to the work of getting every American home, including Paul, whose family is in our hearts today," Cherelle said. "As we celebrate BG being home, we do understand that there are still people out here who are enduring what I endured the last nine months of missing tremendously their loved ones."
"Today, my family is whole," she added. "But as you all are aware, there are so many other families who are not whole."
A former US Marine-turned-security executive, Whelan was arrested at a Moscow hotel in December 2018 over suspicions that he was an American spy. He was subsequently convicted of espionage and sentenced to 16 years in Russian prison, with the possibility of serving time at a labor camp.
Like Griner, Whelan was deemed "wrongfully detained" by the US government. Even still, securing the 52-year-old's freedom has posed far tougher than freeing other wrongfully detained Americans.
Dr. Dani Gilbert, an expert on hostage taking and recovery who is currently a Rosenwald Fellow in US Foreign Policy and International Security at Dartmouth College's John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding, told Insider that Moscow's fierce propaganda campaign against Whelan has significantly complicated negotiations for his release.
"It's really common for a government like Russia or Iran to accuse an American of being a spy, and that's a really convenient charge for them because the American public will basically never know," Gilbert said. "It makes it really complicated to think about what someone was doing in a foreign country and what kinds of deals the United States might be willing to make or not make to get that person home."
Whelan's murky situation and his shaky standing in the court of public opinion has almost certainly driven up the cost of bringing him home. Biden all but confirmed as much during Thursday's press conference.
"This was not a choice about which American to bring home... sadly, for totally illegitimate reasons, Russia is treating Paul's case differently than Brittney's," Biden said. "And while we have not yet succeeded in securing Paul's release, we are not giving up. We will never give up."
"We remain in close touch with Paul's family, the Whelan family, and my thoughts and prayers are with them today — they have to have such mixed emotions today," the president added. "We'll keep negotiating in good faith for Paul's release. I guarantee that."