Julian Assange is concerned not about any proceedings in Sweden as such, but believe that his deportation to Sweden could lead to politically motivated deportation to the United States, where he could face severe penalties, up to the death sentence, for his activities related to WikiLeaks. On 16 August 2012, Foreign Minister Patiño announced that Ecuador was granting Assange political asylum because of the threat represented by the United States secret investigation against him and several calls for assassination from many American politicians. In its formal statement, Ecuador reasoned that "as a consequence of [Assange's] determined defense to freedom of expression and
Julian Assange documents "impacting on the U.S. election campaign". In an interview published on 29 December, Assange said, "The Internet has been returned". In the run-up to 2017 Ecuador's general elections, conservative candidate Guillermo Lasso promised that he would "cordially ask Señor Assange to leave" within 30 days of assuming office, should he be elected. The pro-business candidate said the country's London embassy "isn't a hotel" and that Ecuador is in no position to finance the Australian's stay there. After preliminary results in the second round of Ecuador's presidential election showed that Lasso is poised to lose – the WikiLeaks founder responded