U.S. President Joe Biden says he hopes Russian President Vladimir Putin will be more willing to negotiate the release of WNBA star Brittney Griner now that the U.S. midterm elections are over.
Biden said in a news conference on November 9 that he was "determined to get her home," as well as others.
"My hope is that now that the election is over, that Mr. Putin will be able to discuss with us and be willing to talk more seriously about a prisoner exchange," Biden said.
Earlier on November 9, Griner was moved to a prison in Russia after a Russian court last month rejected her appeal of a nine-year sentence for drug possession, a ruling blasted by Washington as "excessive and disproportionate."
"Brittney was transferred from the detention center in Iksha on November 4," her legal team said in a statement. Her legal team does not have any information on her exact current location or her final destination.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement that the transfer "is another injustice layered on her ongoing unjust and wrongful detention."
Griner, an eight-time all-star center with the WNBA's Phoenix Mercury and a two-time Olympic gold medalist, was convicted on August 4 after police said they found vape canisters containing cannabis oil in her luggage at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport.