President Biden made the "painful decision" to swap jailed basketball star Brittney Griner for notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout after determining that Russia was never going to meet his demand that another jailed American, Paul Whelan, also be freed, U.S. officials said on Thursday.
The big picture: Not only did that mean leaving Whelan behind and freeing a man nicknamed "the Merchant of Death," Biden also had to weigh the risk that other governments might seek to detain Americans to swap them for their own high-value prisoners.
