they ll continue to work on this case. obviously they re so disappointed this morning. what are you hearing from the white house? administration officials telling me, sort of echoing what ken said there. this was the only deal on the table. this was the only deal they could make. the russians had put whelan in a different category, making these claims of espionage that the u.s. government and kwhee lan himself categorically deny. he simply wasn t going to be available in this deal. the u.s. would have had to expand it dramatically. the russians also asked for a spy the u.s. say they don t have. they also asked for someone in german custody, and obviously americans have no ability to free that person. so really this could only be a one for one. if they didn t take this deal, brittney griner was going to remain in that bleak russian prison, so they had to do this. jake sullivan and secretary of state antony blinken had taken a lead on this for week, talks had been sporadic and picked u
and jonathan lemire with us. andrea, what more can you tell us about what went down, including the paul whelan component? we reported some of your new information about what kind of a deal was proposed by the russians, sort of an all or nothing. that s exactly right. it was an all-or-nothing deal according to a senior official. they were told that it was one or none. so it would be brittney griner or if the u.s. insisted on getting paul whelan out somehow there would be no one that would come out, that griner would not be released either. i think you ve noted the extraordinarily generous and nuanced statement from david whelan, paul s young brother who said they are joyful and happy for the griner family, happy that she is out, that the president and the administration did the right thing in having her released and that in this instance, unlike last spring when there was big disappointment to a false alert
fall with an effort to try to get griner out. she is on her way back as noted to a medical facility in san antonio, texas, a military facility where she will be checked out. they specialize in people who suffer injuries overseas or in this case in captivity, so it sounds like it s exactly the right place for her to go. we ll hear more from the administration in the next hour or two with more details as to how this went down. and, yes, willie, officials say, we heard it from the president, they will still be working on paul whelan, they re not giving up hope, but nor do they suggest his release is right around the corner. richard haass, you know, you can t make a deal that s not on the table, that s not ever going to be on the table. there was never going to be a two-for-one swap. we were told that early on. i m sure the biden administration pushed that as far as they could. if you re going to bring americans home, you ve got to
take the deal that is in front of you or walk away from it. and in this case, the biden administration made the deal and, you know, as ken dilanian said, the intel community may be concerned, the state department, the justice department may be concerned, but there is no doubt most americans will celebrate this and be very supportive of the decision made. joe, you know what this reminds me of, the kinds of deals over the years that israel has made, wildly uneven exchanges to get one or two people back and often given up hundreds of people. that s what democratic societies do. they feel the political pressure but also a moral pressure that leaders feel. i understand the criticism that it s uneven, but it s also something we do because this is who we are. and i think this is what democracies have to do as uncomfortable as it is at times. mika, to add in here the whelan family gave a statement
most asymmetrical kind of trade possible, which is why you didn t see a two for one trade, which is why you re seeing the trade of brittney griner, an athlete who was convicted of having vape cartridges in her suitcase being exchanged for somebody called the merchant of death, who was convicted of having surface to air missiles or transferring surface to air missiles to colombian rebels. that s an insane deal. and they want the these trades to be as asymmetrical as possible. . from what i heard earlier this summer and fall, there were things thrown in there like trying to get germany to throw in an fsb officer who was just convicted very recently of