Chelsea Manning, the former US soldier who leaked over 700,000 military intelligence documents to WikiLeaks, has filed to run for Senate in Maryland.
Manning declared in Federal Election Commission filings, dated Jan. 5, her statement of candidacy to run as a Democrat in the 2018 election.
The filing, with the committee name written as "Chelsea Manning for U.S. Senate," was hand-delivered on Jan. 11.
The news of the filing was first reported by the Washington Post. In a Sunday morning tweet, Manning confirmed her candidacy and linked to a campaign ad on YouTube.
Manning would be challenging senior Sen. Ben Cardin, a Democrat who has held the seat since 2007, in the state's primary.
Cardin sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and recently commissioned a 200-page report on the interference by Russia in European elections.
Manning had previously said that after her release from a military prison in Kansas on May 21, 2017, that she would move to Maryland (she is originally from Oklahoma).
In 2013, Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison for the largest leak of classified documents in US history, which included military information about the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and State Department cables.
Considered by groups such as Amnesty International to be a whistleblower, Manning served seven years before her sentence was shortened by President Obama during his final days in office.
Since her release, Manning has been involved in progressive political activism, appearing at rallies in support of DREAMers and the trans community.
In September 2017, Canada barred her from entering the country because immigration officials viewed her offense as akin to "treason."
BuzzFeed News has reached out to Manning's lawyers for comment but has not yet received a response.