Brittney Griner is coming home.
The WNBA star has been in a Russian prison since February after the Russian Federal Customs Service discovered vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage while she was at the airport, about to fly back to the states. She was arrested on drug smuggling charges, and back in August was sentenced to 9 years in prison.
The United States and President Biden have since been working to secure her release, and today it was announced that she would be coming home.
In exchange for Griner’s release, the United States agreed to release Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who was convicted in 2011 of conspiring to sell weapons to a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist operation. Bout was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Critics of the 1-for-1 prisoner swap, though, are disappointed that the Biden administration was unable to secure the release of Paul Whelan, a United States Marine who was convicted by Russia for espionage charges and sentenced to 16 years in prison back in 2018.
Among those who criticized the deal was Dallas Cowboys star linebacker Micah Parsons.
After the prisoner swap was announced, the second-year linebacker out of Penn State tweeted his thoughts on Whelan not being included in the deal:
And in a since-deleted quote tweet of President Biden’s tweet announcing that Griner would be coming home, Parsons took a shot at the president:
But it didn’t take long for Parsons to return to Twitter to explain himself, saying that his tweet was not a shot at Griner but was in support of our military, and that while he’s not a Trump supporter, he’s not a Biden fan either:
“My last tweet was no shot at Brittney Griner. I’m super happy she’s back home as she should be. I just have family who have served and it’s crazy to me the President wouldn’t bring him home too. I’m the furthest thing from a trump supporter but I’m not a fan of Biden either.”
Parsons went on to say that, after talking to “some people” that he respects and trusts, he believes that the Griner prisoner swap was the best possible outcome and that he “made a mistake” in rushing to judgment.
