Trump Swapped Prisoners, Too
Criticizing the Biden administration’s recent prisoner swap of Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout for WNBA star Brittney Griner as “a one-sided disaster,” former President Donald Trump wrongly boasted that his administration “got 58 hostages released from various hostile countries without paying any money, or giving up anything.”
In fact, several of the deals resulting in the release of Americans held hostage or being wrongfully detained abroad came as a result of prisoner swaps during Trump’s time in office.
- In November 2019, the Trump administration secured the release of American Kevin King and Australian Timothy Weeks, who were being held by the Taliban, in exchange for the release of three senior Taliban leaders being held in jails in Afghanistan.
- In December 2019, the U.S. did a prisoner exchange with Iran, freeing Xiyue Wang, a graduate student at Princeton University who was serving a 10-year sentence in Iran on espionage charges. To secure Wang’s release, the U.S. freed Masoud Soleimani, an Iranian scientist convicted of export violations.
- In July 2020, the Trump administration secured the release of Michael White, a
