‘October Surprise’ Delayed: Julian Assange, Wikileaks Push Back US Election Release



Julian Assange today held off releasing information about the US elections or Hillary Clinton, despite widespread expectation that he was poised for a major release.

Speaking via video-link at a Wikileaks anniversary event, Assange burst the bubble of thousands of viewers who listened in hoping for a bombshell “October Surprise”.

He told the audience: “There’s enormous expectation in the United States… some of that expectation will be partly answered.

“But you understand that if we’re going to make a major publication in the United States at a particular hour, we won’t do it at 3am.”

The full press conference was streamed on YouTube and can be viewed here:

Instead of a single damaging leak, Assange promised document dumps on a weekly basis for the next ten weeks, with the first one this week.

He promised that information would relate to the US elections – but did not mention Clinton by name.

When asked directly about Clinton, he denied that he or Wikileaks “intend to harm” the Democratic nominee specifically, but insisted his revelations would be “significant”.

He said: “There has been a lot of misquoting of me and Wikileaks publications.

“And in this particular case the misquoting has to do with that we intend to harm Hillary Clinton… All those are false.

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“They come about as a result principally it seems [inaudible] trying to personalize our publications.

“Our upcoming publications are significant in relation to the US elections.

“Do they show interesting features of US power factions and how they operate? Yes, they do.”

Sources close to the event had previously told Heat Street that Assange planned to release secret files his that have been passed to Wikileaks concerning the US Democratic Party, which by extension were expected to touch on Hillary Clinton.

Assange had been set to appear in London, but canceled after implying that he feared an assassination attempt. He did not elaborate on the threats during the press conference.

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Assange appeared on Fox News last month, repeating his assertion that Wikileaks has damaging documents on Clinton and suggested WikiLeaks may soon release “teasers”. This has yet to take place.

It was only this summer that Assange’s group leaked thousands of embarrassing emails from the Democratic National Committee which showed their disdain for Bernie Sanders’ insurgent campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The uproar over the disclosures forced DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz to resign in disgrace on the eve of the Democratic National Convention.

Assange and his supporters have long claimed that his personal safety is at risk due to the danger he (supposedly) represents to Clinton’s presidential ambitions.

Monday morning, Wikileaks via Twitter was promoting the conspiracy theory that Clinton herself has sought to murder Assange.

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In August, liberal commentator Bob Beckel did suggest in a TV appearance that Assange be murdered, proclaiming that someone should “shoot the son of a bitch!”

Assange himself also hinted publicly that low-level DNC staffer Seth Rich, who was murdered this summer in Washington DC, was the source for Wikileaks’ document dump on the DNC – and that Rich’s alleged role in the leaks was linked to his death.

There has been no evidence linking Rich to the leak and no evidence that his murder was anything more than a botched robbery.

Hype about the Wikileaks event had anti-Clinton conspiracy theorists working up a frantic stew of speculation – but has so far failed to produce results.

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