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Prisoners

s.b.f sam bankman-fried
William D. Cohan • September 15, 2024

Inside S.B.F.’s Legal Bunker

Notes on Sam Bankman-Fried’s fiery 102-page appeal, his demand for a new trial, and why he argues that everyone—well, at least Judge Lewis Kaplan, FTX’s attorneys, and the media—was out to convict him from the start.
Julia Ioffe • August 6, 2024
Putin’s Hostage Games
russia prisoner swap vladimir putin
While the Americans released by Russia in last week’s prisoner swap celebrated their emancipation, the Kremlin set about carefully spinning the exchange as confirmation of their captives’ guilt, while also celebrating a political coup of their own.
Julia Ioffe • March 19, 2024
The Navalny Prisoner Swap Deal That Wasn’t
alexey navalny
Notes on the frustrations and fixations of the Georgetown set: a Russian hostage exchange mystery, the irony of Netanyahu’s foreign meddling, and the tragedy of Putin’s comical election.
American officials are privately frustrated by the view, held by Russia, that the U.S. government will do absolutely anything to bring American hostages home, no matter what they’ve done and no matter where they are in the world.
Julia Ioffe • January 23, 2024
A White House Prisoner Dilemma
As another American is arrested in Russia, giving Putin more leverage for prisoner swaps, Biden officials are growing frustrated that some see a U.S. passport as a get-out-of-jail-free card. And Robert Woodland—now Robert Woodland Romanov—is no Brittney Griner.
Administration officials say that Moscow appears to be in absolutely no mood to negotiate.
Julia Ioffe • May 2, 2023
Inside the Gershkovich Prisoner Swap Crisis
Despite Biden’s public commitment to bring Evan home, the people tasked with making it happen worry privately that Moscow hasn’t made clear what it wants in return for his freedom.
Brittney Griner
Julia Ioffe • December 8, 2022
Inside the Griner Prisoner Swap
Behind the scenes, the White House has alternated between pessimism and fury over Russia’s bad-faith negotiations, which is just how the Kremlin likes it. In the end, Biden had to settle for what he could get: a partial political victory.
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lands in Taiwan
Julia Ioffe • August 2, 2022
Pelosi’s Last Cold War & The Griner Prisoner Dilemma
The Speaker’s trip to Taipei is the latest, and possibly the final hawkish turn in her three decade conflict with Beijing. (“She wants to stick it to China,” as one person put it.) Meanwhile in Washington, the Biden administration faces a lose-lose negotiation with Moscow.