Brittney Griner’s Wife Tells Gayle King She Was In Oval Office When Biden Broke The News That ‘We Got Her’

Brittney Griner‘s wife, Cherelle Griner, described to CBS’ Gayle King the moment she learned from President Joe Biden in the Oval Office that her wife would be released from Russian custody.

Brittney was arrested in Russia in February for drug smuggling charges when she brought less than one gram of CBD oil into Russia. After being held in Russian custody for nine months, Griner was released in a 1-for-1 prisoner swap for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. He is known as the “merchant of death.”

King told the story on CBS Mornings about the phone call she received from Cherelle that described how she found out her wife would be coming home.

“Last night, I was at an event about to go on stage, my phone rang, and I looked, and it was Cherelle Griner calling me,” King said. “I was very surprised that she was calling at that particular time, and I thought, ‘what could this be?'”

King described that Cherelle began to discuss her day and explained how she found out there was a chance the U.S. government had a deal in place to bring her wife, Brittney, home. She found out she would meet with National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.

“She said about a week ago; she got a call from The White House that says, ‘we’re feeling optimistic,’ but she had no idea what that meant,” King added. “On Tuesday, she got a call that says, ‘you need to go to Washington for a meeting with Jake Sullivan.'”

King elaborated that Cherelle was unsure if it would be good news she would be receiving from Sullivan or bad news because they had her fly into D.C.

“When she gets to Washington, they said, ‘the President would like to see you,'” King continued. “She goes into the Oval Office, and she said the first thing Joe Biden said to her was, ‘we got her.'”

Cherelle told King it took her a few moments to understand what Biden meant by that. She thought she would fly back to Phoneix on Thursday because that’s what the government told her.

The White House only gave Cherelle a few details about Brittney’s release because they were afraid of leaks to the media. They gave her the option to sit in the audience or stand alongside Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for the news conference to announce that they got her release from prison.

“She said, ‘I will stand beside the two of you because you are bringing my wife home,'” King explained.

“I’m smiling so much my face hurts,'” Cherelle described to King.

King added that Cherelle wore red because it is Griner’s favorite color.

Watch above via CBS.