Leaked Twitter messages indicate WikiLeaks bias against Clinton: report

Leaked Twitter messages, sent during the 2016 presidential race, between WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and top supporters of the media organization that were published Wednesday show an institutional bias against Democrats and then-presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
The Intercept published direct messages between the official WikiLeaks Twitter account, run by Assange, and about 10 of the organization’s top supporters sent during the 2016 race that revealed Assange’s disdain for Clinton’s policies and desire for a GOP victory.
{mosads}“We believe it would be much better for GOP to win,” Assange wrote from the organization’s official account. “Dems+Media+liberals would then form a block to reign [sic] in their worst qualities. With Hillary in charge, GOP will be pushing for her worst qualities., dems+media+neoliberals will be mute.”
“She’s a bright, well connected, sadistic sociopath,” he added.
Assange went on in other messages to mention Clinton’s foreign policy record as a top reason for WikiLeaks’ opposition to the Democratic Party during the election.
“Hillary has the greater freedom to start wars than the GOP and has the will to do so,” he said.
Another leaked message containing anti-Semitic undertones targeted an Associated Press reporter critical of WikiLeaks over his Jewish ancestry.
“He’s always ben a rat,” Assange posted in the Twitter group, referring to AP reporter Raphael Satter. “But he’s jewish and engaged with the ((()))) issue.”
According to The Intercept, the parentheses in the message is a reference to neo-Nazis’ practice of identifying Jews online by enclosing their names with three parentheses.
Assange has publicly questioned the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election with the intention of helping then-candidate Donald Trump, while Democrats, including Clinton herself, have accused him of being complicit in Moscow’s hacking efforts targeting the Democratic National Committee and her campaign.
“Assange has become a kind of nihilistic opportunist who does the bidding of a dictator,” she said in October.
“WikiLeaks is unfortunately now practically a fully owned subsidiary of Russian intelligence.”
The Intercept’s report follows an admission from Donald Trump Jr., who worked on his father’s presidential campaign, back in November that he privately exchanged messages with WikiLeaks during the campaign.
Messages from the organization requesting Trump’s tax returns or suggesting that Trump contest the election results if he lost went largely unanswered by Trump Jr., though the correspondence continued until July.
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