Benzinga - Democratic Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. expressed his clear stance on figures such as Julian Assange and Edward Snowden.
What Happened: Kennedy Jr. in an interview with Bitcoin Magazine published on Wednesday vowed to pardon them on his first day in office if elected as president. Additionally, he expressed interest in reviewing the case of Ross Ulbricht, the founder of Silk Road, to determine the fairness of his conviction and sentence.
Former Central Intelligence Agency contractor Edward Snowden, a self-proclaimed whistleblower, as well as Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, have been pursued by the U.S. government for years over accusations they leaked confidential and sensitive information.
Kennedy Jr. stated, “Yeah, I will pardon Julian Assange on day one, and probably Snowden as well. And I will look at other cases… I’m gonna look at Ross Ulbricht's case, to see if he was justly convicted, or if he was being made an example of in order to discourage, you know, Bitcoin or the industry.”
Ulbricht is serving a double life sentence for his role in creating the Silk Road marketplace on the dark web that allowed users to purchase almost anything, including illegal substances, with Bitcoin. The Silk Road website was created in 2011 and was eventually shut down by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 2013.