On Wednesday, Julian Assange pleaded guilty to a violation of the U.S. Espionage Act, following which his brother expressed gratitude to the crypto community and believed that the donations from the community had saved Assange from a bleak future.
Assange’s half-brother, Gabriel Shipton, said in an exclusive interview with Decrypt on Wednesday, “I have no doubt that if the AssangeDAO community hadn’t been so generous and raised so much money to contribute to his freedom, he wouldn’t be in the position he’s in now.” “In short, it saved his life.”
AssangeDAO is a decentralized autonomous organization aimed at helping Assange with his legal defense. In 2022, it raised approximately $53 million worth of ETH and pooled it to purchase a symbolic NFT. The proceeds from the sale were subsequently donated to the Courage Foundation to fund Assange’s high legal costs and other expenses related to the campaign for freedom of publishing.
Shipton stated that the large-scale fundraising activity in the crypto community was completely unexpected at the time, giving Assange a means to fight back against the U.S. government’s punishment for leaking national secrets.
“I think it was a sudden move by the crypto community that completely caught the people pursuing Julian off guard,” Shipton said. “They thought that they had dried up Julian, and even our family’s funds.”
Shipton mentioned that the crypto funds not only enabled Assange to mount an appropriate legal defense but also accumulated political momentum for Assange’s release through social media advertising and numerous trips by family members, including Shipton, to Australia and the U.S. to lobby politicians.
“I’ve done many trips, flown into D.C. to advocate for Julian in Congress,” he said. “These wouldn’t have been possible without AssangeDAO.”
Today, Assange’s family also received a donation of approximately $500,000 in Bitcoin to cover the final travel and recovery expenses incurred by Assange’s guilty plea on Wednesday in a remote U.S. territory in the Pacific.
The close connection between WikiLeaks and cryptocurrencies dates back to the origins of Bitcoin. In 2010, pseudonymous Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto implored WikiLeaks not to accept Bitcoin donations, fearing that such integration would trigger government scrutiny of cryptocurrencies.
When WikiLeaks was eventually blacklisted from traditional payment methods, the document-leaking nonprofit began accepting BTC as a means of survival, providing one of the first real-world use cases for blockchain payments.
In 2017, Assange read out the latest block hash of Bitcoin in a webcast, dispelling rumors of his death.
Shipton believes that the intertwining paths of Assange and cryptocurrencies are no coincidence.
“For a lot of people, a lot of innovators, a lot of technologists, it represents their freedom,” Shipton said. “He uses technology, cryptography, and internet architecture to disseminate true information.”
Assange arrived in Australia on Wednesday night local time for the first time in many years.
Shipton said after exchanging texts with Assange today that he believed his brother was very relieved – now that he had reunited with his family and was sleeping in a proper bed.
