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Jack Teixeira, the Massachusetts Air National Guardsman who is serving a 15-year prison sentence for leaking national defense secrets, is now pleading with President Donald Trump to issue him a pardon because he feels his case was “politicized” by the Biden administration.
In his first interview since he was arrested more than two years ago, Teixeira also described himself as a “patriot” and said that he would do the same thing if he had the chance to do it all over again. “I still believe in my actions,” he told ABC News.
Speaking to ABC News host Linsey Davis by phone from federal prison this week, Teixeira – who pleaded guilty last year to six federal counts of willfully retaining and transmitting national defense information – defended sharing troop movements in Ukraine and other classified information on the gaming platform Discord.
“My intent was to educate the United States populist people about what was going on. It was not to harm the United States or the country because I love my nation. I'm a patriot,” he said. “It was by no means meant to harm my country, but I did believe that I needed to educate the people about what was going on because I believe they were being lied to.”
Following his arrest, then-Attorney General Merrick Garland said Teixiera “endangered our country's national security and that of our allies” all in an effort “to impress anonymous friends on the internet.” After the 23-year-old was sentenced, now-former FBI Director Christopher Wray said it was a “stark warning to all those entrusted with protecting national defense information: betray that trust, and you will be held accountable.”
Besides pleading guilty to the federal counts, which resulted in prosecutors agreeing not to charge him under the Espionage Act, Teixeira also pleaded guilty to a military charge of obstructing justice. He was dishonorably discharged but avoided any additional jail time.
While he appeared remorseful at his sentencing hearing, Teixeira now insists that his apology was mostly to his family and friends and that he believes that his actions caused no harm. Instead, he feels he was made an example of by former President Joe Biden.
“I just feel like there are people who have done far worse things as far as what they did with similar information, and they didn't get as bad of a treatment as I did. But my case was specifically politicized by the Biden administration,” he said, adding: “I think that I was used as a sacrificial lamb, and I was crucified to be made of as an example.”
While prosecutors noted that Teixeira was told to stop conducting “deep dives” into classified information, which resulted in him “purposefully and repeatedly” taking classified documents without permission, he maintains he was merely doing his “due diligence” and following directives laid out by his superiors.
Meanwhile, he said that it was the “lies” being told by the Biden administration about the Ukraine war that prompted him to leak those secrets online.
“A lot of the things that the administration at the time was saying was wrong,” he said. “It was misleading, it was outright false, or it was skewed, and essentially just, I wanted people to know exactly what was going on so that no one could say, ‘Well, it was like this because the history book or the history textbook said it was.’”
Adding that he “would have done it again” despite his 15-year sentence, Teixeira revealed that his lawyer is directly appealing to the president for a pardon.
“I think they'll look at someone like me as a supporter and someone who really used what I thought was going to be my last vote in county jail for Trump during 2024,” Teixiera declared. “And I just, I believe that indeed he will.”
With the dishonorably discharged guardsman begging Trump to “please give me back to my family, to reunite with my family with my rights as an American and with my freedom,” his attorney filed an application for a full pardon on Wednesday.
