In his latest tweet, Kennedy expressed that the United States doesn’t celebrate free speech but rather persecutes journalists and whistleblowers. Kennedy tweeted “Instead of championing free speech, the U.S. actively persecutes journalists and whistleblowers. I’ll pardon brave truth-tellers like Julian Assange and investigate the corruption and crimes they exposed.” After stating he plans to pardon Assange if elected, he fired off a secondary tweet promising to also pardon other persecuted journalist and whistleblower’s such as “John Kiriakou, Chelsea Manning, Reality Winner, Daniel Hale, Thomas Drake, Jeffrey Sterling, and Edward Snowden.”