LIVE: Hands Off Assange Rally

*Thanks to Consortium News for streaming the Hands Off Assange rally at the Justice Department.

I will be speaking at a rally outside the US Justice Department, which is scheduled for 12-3pm ET.

The action was organized in support of the "Surround Parliament" human chain event in London that Stella Assange and other activists organized.

Speakers for the DC event (full list): Rev. Annie Chambers, Ben Cohen, Chip Gibbons, Chris Hedges, Dave Decamp, Eliza Bleu, Esther Iverem, Garland Nixon, James Bovard, Jill Stein, John Kiriakou, Joe Lauria, Jon Stasevich, Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, Randy Credico, Sabrina Salvati, Scott Ritter, and Steven Donziger.

It's been quite a while since I was in Washington, DC. I'm having flashbacks to my trips from Chicago to DC to cover Pfc. Chelsea Manning's court-martial.

My message: this is the scene of the crime. Here is where a kind of brotherhood of prosecutors bonded by their commitment to preserving the religion of US national security and the project of America have waged lawfare. They have kept a journalist in prison and remain committed to bringing him to the US for an Espionage Act trial.

What is it going to take to free him? We can't simply throw up our hands and say it can't be done because if the US Justice Department succeeds in their case—fully backed and enabled by the CIA, then press freedom and the larger civil liberty of freedom of expression will be gravely damaged.