Joe Biden and Kamala Harris met the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and two other freed American prisoners just hours after Washington and Moscow completed their largest prisoner exchange since the cold war.
On a muggy evening at Andrews air force base near Washington DC, Gershkovich and the other freed prisoners, the ex-marine Paul Whelan and the journalist Alsu Kurmasheva, touched down on US soil and shortly later disembarked a Bombardier jet from Turkey. They were met by their families and the US president and vice-president.
As he stepped off the jet, Gershkovich embraced Harris and Biden several times, then stepped over to his mother, Ella, and lifted her off the ground in an embrace. He was also met by his father, Mikhail, and sister Danielle.
After a few minutes spent chatting with family, Gershkovich approached the crowd of reporters and began to embrace his friends and colleagues.
Asked how he was feeling he said: “I feel fine.” But he also spoke about his feelings boarding the bus with the other freed detainees on Thursday and said he was happy to see Russians on board as well.
“There’s one thing I would like to say. It was great to get on that bus today and see not just Americans and Germans but Russian political prisoners.
“I spent a month in prison in Yekaterinburg where everyone I sat with was a political prisoner. Nobody knows them publicly, they have various political beliefs, they are not all connected with Navalny supporters, who everyone knows about. I would potentially like to see if we could do something about them as well. I’d like to talk to people about that in the next weeks and months.”
He was also met by senior editors at the Wall Street Journal, including the editor-in-chief, Emma Tucker, and Gordon Fairclough. Several times he repeated: “My mother writes very nice things about you.”
There were squeals of joy as Kurmasheva’s young daughters, Miriam and Bibi, ran to hug her, followed by a warm embrace from husband, Pavel Butorin.
Whelan, who was met by his sister Elizabeth, also appeared healthy. He said that he felt fine, that he only believed that he was free as the flight flew further from Turkey over continental Europe and the the UK, and that his plan now was to “eat a steak”.
Speaking on the tarmac later, Biden rejected the idea that prisoner swaps could lead to other Americans being detained. “I don’t buy this idea of ... let these people rot in jail because other people may be captured.”
Harris called the deal an “extraordinary testament to the importance of having a president who understands the power of diplomacy”.
On Friday morning, Jake Sullivan, the US national security advisor, told ABC’s Good Morning America show that the prisoner swap had been “such a human victory. It was also a victory for our country”.
He added: “This was the United States of America at our best, working with our allies to bring home our people.” He also hailed the release of other prisoners who had stood up to the Russian regime as “freedom fighters”.
Sullivan said the deal was clinched because of Joe Biden’s international relationships, with the US president’s ties “unlocking the deal” that the US and European allies struck with Russia.
“It would not have happened without him,” he said.
He denied that such deals encourage hostile regimes to kidnap or imprison more innocent Americans, saying that during the Biden administration about 70 Americans held overseas had been released and there had not been a matching surge in those detained.
Hundreds of journalists came to the base to catch their first glimpse of the freed detainees who, combined, had spent nearly a decade in Russian captivity. They were among 16 American, Russian dissident and German prisoners freed by Russia, in exchange for eight Russians freed by the US, Germany, Norway, Slovenia and Poland. Those returning to Russia included a number of undercover spies and a convicted FSB assassin whom Vladimir Putin had obsessively sought to free from German prison for years.
Gershkovich’s family said earlier in a statement: “We have waited 491 days for Evan’s release, and it’s hard to describe what today feels like. We can’t wait to give him the biggest hug and see his sweet and brave smile up close. Most important now is taking care of Evan and being together again. No family should have to go through this, and so we share relief and joy today with Paul and Alsu’s families.”
Whelan was detained in 2018 on espionage charges and served more than five years in pre-trial detention and then a labor colony.
“Paul Whelan is not in a Russian labor colony any longer, but he is not home,” his family wrote in a statement. “While Paul was wrongfully imprisoned in Russia, he lost his home. He lost his job. We are unsure how someone overcomes these losses and rejoins society after being a hostage. We are grateful for everyone’s efforts to help Paul while he was away. We hope you will continue to help him by providing Paul the space and privacy he needs as he rebuilds his life. It is Paul’s story to tell and he will tell it when he is able.”
Kurmasheva, a Radio Free Europe journalist who was arrested on charges of failing to register herself as a foreign agent and then charged with spreading false information about the Russian military, had been sentenced to more than six years in prison.
The Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin and several other opposition figures were also freed, including the British-Russian politician Vladimir Kara-Murza and three people who had worked as regional coordinators for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in prison earlier this year.
Kira Yarmysh, a spokesperson for Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said on X that Harris had called Navalnaya “to discuss the exchange and express her support”, noting her and her husband’s contributions to the fight for a democratic Russia.
Navalnaya thanked Harris for the US assistance and called on the international community to facilitate the release of other Russian political prisoners, Yarmysh said.
Early on Friday, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, met some of the freed detainees, many of whom he said “feared for their health and even their lives”.
Speaking at Cologne airport, Scholz insisted the swap was “the right decision, and if you had any doubts, you will lose them after talking to those who are now free”.
The complex deal had involved months of negotiations between multiple countries and came together in extreme secrecy, with the location and exact makeup of the exchange not made public until the last moment. Sullivan told reporters that Navalny was meant to be a part of the deal before his death in February. On the day of his death, Sullivan said, he met Gershkovich’s mother and said he still saw a path forward for the deal.
