Rep. Guy Reschenthaler: I will never abandon Marc Fogel

Over the past five years, I’ve worked to solve a multitude of issues facing American citizens overseas. In 2020, my office helped secure the African evacuation of Andrew Mewbourn, a Hempfield Township teacher suffering from a severe eye ailment. In 2021, I fought to hold President Biden accountable for his disastrous decision to leave American citizens stranded in Afghanistan amidst his administration’s bungled military withdrawal.

Recently, two Pennsylvanians — Malphine and Anne Fogel — reached out to me with a different urgent plea: To advocate on behalf of their son and brother, Marc, who has been wrongfully imprisoned in Russia since August 2021.

A Butler native, Marc taught history courses at schools overseas, spending the last 10 years teaching in Russia. On Aug. 14, 2021, he was stopped by Russian police at an airport and arrested for possession of medical marijuana used to treat his severe back injury, a charge very similar to that of WNBA player Brittney Griner. The 64-year-old father is serving a 14-year hard-labor sentence in a Russian penal colony.

In the months following his arrest, I’ve watched in horror as President Biden’s State Department refuses to classify Marc as wrongfully detained, despite meeting at least six of the 11 established criteria to be designated as such. Attempts to demand information from Secretary of State Antony Blinken have been largely ignored, and radio silence promptly ensued. Marc’s family also gets the work-around from the State Department in their correspondence.

At the same time, Biden cheered on the prisoner swap of Griner for Russia’s Merchant of Death. While Marc is still waiting to be classified as wrongfully detained, Griner was designated less than three months after her arrest. With her prisoner exchange, the Biden administration lost considerable leverage in bringing home other American citizens wrongfully held in Russia — including Marc.

Upon Griner’s quick release, her family immediately celebrated at the White House, and the president held a massive press conference, proudly proclaiming, “We never forgot about Brittney.”

He’s right. Instead, Biden forgot about Marc.

In addition to Griner, Democrats in the White House have highlighted efforts to bring home other American citizens detained overseas, including former Marine Paul Whelan and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. But time and time again, Biden and his team leave Marc’s name out of his remarks and fail even to acknowledge his existence. These attempts at ghosting the Fogel family in public and private are shameful and bring into question the administration’s motivations.

If Marc was a celebrity or more valuable to Biden’s team, would he still be largely ignored by the White House? It is awful to imagine our nation’s leaders are picking winners and losers based merely on social currency. I hope this is not the case.

But while the administration remains silent, I’m doing all I can to bring Marc home. Although I’ve been fighting for his release since last year, I had the honor of meeting Malphine and Anne for the first time in my office at the U.S. Capitol last month. As I sat with them inside the whip’s office and discussed our next steps forward, I made it clear to them that I would never stop advocating for Marc’s release from Russia and would do everything possible to get answers from the State Department.

That’s why I’m introducing legislation this week to require more transparency from the State Department regarding how wrongful determinations are made. The appropriately named Marc Fogel Act would require the State Department to transmit copies of documents and communications to Congress on why a wrongful determination has or has not been made — within 180 days of the department’s review of a detention. It is my hope that this bill will jump-start efforts to work for everyday Americans held captive overseas, not just celebrities.

No family should be left in the dark when a foreign government takes their loved one. It’s time to get answers on why the Biden administration refuses to shine a light on Marc Fogel’s case.

U.S. Rep. Guy Reschenthaler represents Pennsylvania’s 14th Congressional District. He is chief deputy whip for the 118th Congress.