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Russia has released a former US Marine from prison on humanitarian grounds, Donald Trump announced.
“After my discussions with President Vladimir Putin, Russia has agreed to release him, very much on a Humanitarian Basis,” the US president said of Robert Gilman in a social media post.
Trump included a photo of Gilman, a 32-year-old teacher who had been imprisoned in Russia since 2022, on a jet bound for the US accompanied by his mother and US officials. Gilman was expected to land at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on Tuesday evening, the president said.
Gilman’s release was not part of an exchange and the US had provided no concessions to Russia in return, a state department spokesperson said.
The US, they added, would continue to work to secure the release of all Americans unjustly detained in Russia, including Stephen Hubbard, a retired US teacher accused by Moscow of serving in a Ukrainian territorial defence unit.
Gilman’s release was the culmination of a weekend of intense diplomacy between US and Russian officials, according to a US official.
It comes as the Trump administration considers a further visit to Moscow by special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the president’s son in law, seeking to jump-start efforts to end the war in Ukraine.
Witkoff and deputy national security adviser Sebastian Gorka, who had worked to secure Gilman’s release, are expected to greet him upon his arrival, a US official told Reuters, which was first to report the release.
During both terms in office, Trump has made the release of Americans wrongfully detained abroad a top priority, and more than 100 people have been released since he returned to the White House last year.
In the first weeks of Trump’s second term, Moscow released American teacher Marc Fogel, who flew back to the US with Witkoff, as a goodwill gesture.
Gilman had been imprisoned in Russia since 2022, accused of kicking a police officer while drunk. Gilman’s family has disputed the claim, saying that he was ill when the incident occurred and had kicked the police officer by accident.
Gilman was deemed wrongfully detained by the US, an official determination applied to people who have been unlawfully or unfairly imprisoned.
His release comes as advocates warned that Gilman’s health had deteriorated to such a point during his imprisonment that his life could be in jeopardy.
Kieran Ramsey of Global Reach, an organisation that has advocated for the release of Gilman and other Americans detained abroad, said in an interview with PBS Newshour on Monday that the former Marine was in a “catatonic state” and was being fed through a nasogastric tube.
