Brittney Griner Is Free

Brittney Griner, a WNBA star, was freed to the United States in a prisoner swap Thursday, according to US officials, ending her 294-day ordeal in a Russian jail.

Officials from the United States verified to VICE News and other media sources that Griner was released in exchange for Russian arms trader Viktor Bout. According to CBS News, President Joe Biden approved the agreement within the previous week.

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Griner, who was sentenced to nine years in prison in August, has returned to the United States, according to American officials. According to CBS News, Biden is scheduled to speak at the White House Thursday morning to announce the agreement. According to reports, Paul Whelan, a former Marine convicted of spying in Russia, was not included in the deal.

President Joe Biden announced the agreement in a tweet Thursday morning, showing himself in the Oval Office with Brittney Griner's wife, Cherelle Griner, and Vice President Kamala Harris.

Biden and Cherelle Griner made an appearance at the White House to announce the agreement.

"This is a day we've been looking forward to for a long time," Biden added. "It took hard and tough negotiating." Despite "needless trauma," Griner is in "good spirits and relieved to finally be heading home," according to Biden, who added that Griner would be back in the United States within the next 24 hours.

“We never forgot about Brittney. We haven’t forgotten about Paul Whelan,” Biden said. “While we have not yet succeeded in securing Paul’s release, we have not given up. We will never give up.”

Griner was detained for the first time in February at Russia's Sheremetyevo Airport for having less than a gram of marijuana oil in her luggage. Her detention came barely two weeks before Russia's invasion of neighboring Ukraine, complicating her abroad detention significantly.

Griner pleaded guilty to drug possession and smuggling charges, stating that she had a prescription for the drug from her doctor back home in Arizona and had brought them by mistake for her trip.

She was detained for seven months before being sentenced to nine years in jail, barely a year short of the maximum for these offenses. In October, an attempt to appeal the punitive punishment was refused.

She was sent last month to Mordovia's remote, all-female penal colony IK-2, a former Lenin-era gulag infamous for brutal conditions and subjecting its victims to horrific labor techniques.

“For the last nine months you all have been so privy for one of the darkest moments of my life,” Cherelle Griner expressed gratitude to Biden for securing her wife's release at the White House. “Today my family is whole, but as you're all aware, there are so many families that are not whole. [Brittney] and I will remain committed to the work of getting every American home, including Paul.”

After months of negotiations, the Russian government categorically stated that they would only accept a one-for-one swap and would not release Whelan, according to a senior Biden administration official speaking on the record with reporters.

Bout, a former Soviet military officer who inspired Nicholas Cage's film 'Lord of War,' was 11 years into a 25-year sentence for planning to kill Americans and terrorism-related crimes when he was exchanged for Griner. Bout was scheduled to be released in August 2029.

“This was not a situation in which we had a choice of which American to bring home,” the official said. “It was a choice between bringing home one particular American, Brittney Griner, or bringing home none.”

The person told reporters that releasing Griner was a "moral decision," but that the administration is "determined to avoid these types of events in the future," including by issuing travel restrictions to foreign officials implicated in wrongfully detaining Americans and other diplomatic steps.

Though her closest friends, family, and government officials appeared to be silent throughout the early months of Griner's detention, this was purportedly owing to a planned operation conducted by the US Department of State to secure her safety overseas.

Nonetheless, many of her supporters condemned the government's inaction for months, as well as the circumstances that brought the two-time Olympic gold medalist to Russia in the first place. She is one of the hundreds of WNBA professional basketball players that play worldwide to augment the league's poor salary.

Griner's incarceration reignited discussions about why WNBA athletes are paid a fraction of what their male counterparts are paid, and the WNBA is now changing its policies for the 2023 season to fine players who prioritize international games before the start of the American leagues season in order to push them back home.