The sentence is the thing I've picked up on. Basically I've heard a few grumblings that people think she got a harsher penalty because she was trans. But even if that is the case, (and I'm not convinced that it is,) seven years is too lenient considering that this person basically committed treason.
We should probably have a thread on this if we don't, but I disagree. I think Manning got a hugely disproportionate sentence largely because Edward Snowden did a lot worse and so far has gotten away with it. And I more or less agree with what Snowden did, at least in principle, although it's legally fucked.
Manning just happened to be in a situation, unlike Snowden, where trial under the UCMJ and the fact of an oath not to do what Manning did, made a sentence a lot larger. So it was almost kicking the dog because the cat got away. Manning had access to a ridiculous number of classified documents, but they were mostly fucking boring shit. Manning's leaks caused little measurable harm to anyone, unlike Snowden's.
Manning, however, was a serious mental case even minus the tranny shit, and it's ludicrous someone like Manning was allowed access to classified material in the first place. Manning was also taken advantage of, while in a highly impressionable state that should have been obvious to any competent CO, by the Wikileaks assholes, including the disgusting snitch Adrian Lamo, who literally pumped Manning up to leak everything, just to throw a snitchfest immediately thereafter.
Then Wikileaks jerkoffs like Julian Assange capitalized on that shit, while hanging Manning out to dry when the obvious happened.
Treason is specifically providing enemies we're at war with assistance with the specific intention of it altering the outcome of the war. It is levying war against us. Not just leaking embarrassing documents to the world at large. That just isn't treason. The definition of treason is specifically limited in the fucking Constitution itself because of the reprehensible English practice of labeling damn near everything treason.
(Of the UCMJ charges Manning actually went to trial on, Manning was acquitted of the one, "aiding the enemy," that would be necessary to be being an actual traitor.)
I don't agree with pardoning Manning. What Manning did is obviously a crime. But I would be totally fine with commuting the sentence. Seven years at Leavenworth is no picnic, and certainly isn't for some tranny. Justice must be tempered with mercy, bla bla bla.