ORT MEADE, MD – JULY 30: U.S. Army Private First Class Bradley Manning (R) is escorted by military police as arrives to hear the verdict in his military trial July 30, 2013 at Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. Manning, who is charged with aiding the enemy and wrongfully causing intelligence to be published on the internet, is accused of sending hundreds of thousands of classified Iraq and Afghanistan war logs and more than 250,000 diplomatic cables to the website WikiLeaks while he was working as an intelligence analyst in Baghdad in 2009 and 2010. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Army Private Chelsea Manning—the WikiLeaks whistle-blower who leaked thousands of classified and sensitive documents and was recently sentenced to a 35-year prison sentence—has officially filed for a presidential pardon, according to a press release from the Private Manning Support Network.

Manning’s chief counsel, David Coombs filed the application on her behalf, and in a cover letter, urged President Obama release Manning immediately, citing that what Manning did was not a threat to national security. Rather, the information Manning leaked disclosed questionable practices by the United States government to the public and by locking her up, sets a dangerous precedent for future whistleblowers:

Private Manning is a military whistleblower. He disclosed documents that were vital for a healthy public debate about our conduct in Iraq and Afghanistan, our detention policies at Guantanamo, and out diplomatic activities around the world. The sentence given to him by the military judge grossly exaggerates the seriousness of his conduct… It will undoubtedly have a chilling effect on future whistleblowers and damage the public’s perception of military justice.

In her application, Manning writes that the reasons she decided to leak those documents in 2010 “were made out of a concern for my country and the world that we live in,” citing that the nature of fighting a war with an “enemy that chooses not to meet us on a tradition battlefield” has raised some questionable war tactics that she did not agree with.

We consciously elected to devalue human life both in Iraq and Afghanistan. When we engaged those that we perceived were the enemy, we sometimes killed innocent civilians. Whenever we killed innocent civilians, instead of accepting responsibility for our conduct, we elected to hide behind the veil of national security and classified information in order to avoid any public accountability.

Amnesty International also lent their voice of support for Manning in the pardon application, stating that “Manning should be shown clemency in recognition of [her] motives for acting as [she] did, the treatment [she] endured in [her] early pre-trial detention, and the due process shortcomings during [her] trial.” Amnesty International has also started an official White House petition to demand Manning’s release, which has already racked up more than 20,000 signatures.

Filed Under: amnesty international, bradley manning, chelsea manning, david coombs, presidential pardon, white house petition,