Chelsea Manning To Resume Active Duty In Army, Fight For Transgender Causes After Release

Chelsea Manning, 29 year-old transgender woman, will be released from prison May 17, Wednesday, after the bulk of her 35-year sentence was commuted by former President Barack Obama in January.

The Iraq War whistleblower and former Army soldier had said in a statement last week she was looking forward to her release and that she will be able to live as her authentic self in public for the first time.

Manning had said in the statement: "For the first time, I can see a future for myself as Chelsea. I can imagine surviving and living as the person who I am and can finally be in the outside world. Freedom used to be something that I dreamed of but never allowed myself to fully imagine...I am forever grateful to the people who kept me alive, President Obama, my legal team and countless supporters."

Read: WikiLeaks Informant, Chelsea Manning, Confirms Prison Release

Manning, who imprisoned in 2013 as a man named Bradley, had changed her name, identified as a woman and received hormone treatment while incarcerated. Dave Foster, an Army spokesman, told USA Today said following Manning's release from military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, Wednesday, she will remain on active duty in army, as an unpaid soldier, and will be eligible for health care and other benefits, according to reports.

Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison for providing more than 700,000 government files to WikiLeaks that revealed classified information about the U.S. military and diplomatic activities around the world. The sentence was the longest ever handed down in a case involving a leak of government documents with the intention of making it accessible to public, reports said.

According to American Civil Liberties Union, Manning wants to contribute to the transgender community after being released. She wants to fight for them, primarily transgender women of color, held in custody and also shape up public opinion about what it means to be one.

Some people who have made contact with Manning in the recent few months share their experiences of how energetic she is, despite her being behind bars and in an 'opaque' military prison system.

Evan Greer, a trans activist who serves as campaign director for the advocacy group Fight For The Future, has told Vocativ she had been contacting Manning by phone once a week for the past several years. She said: "It’s a surreal feeling to have gotten to know someone so well. We’ve been through a lot together, but I’ve never been able to see her face or give her a hug...Right now it’s a big mix of excitement, trepidation, and waiting to see what comes next.”

A cryptographer named Isis Agora Lovecruft befriended Manning soon after being in touch with the whistleblower with lawyers' help. Lovecruft shared with Vocativ how Manning had took up learning advanced cryptography inside the disciplinary barracks. Manning learnt an entire cryptosystem in a computer language called Sage by dictating code written on sheets of paper to her lawyers over the phone.

Lovecruft said: “Chelsea’s code was well-written, and I was excited that she was not only persevering but studying post-quantum cryptography...But mostly I felt angry, and frankly a bit nauseous, at the injustices involved in requiring someone as brilliant as her to dictate code over the phone.”