September 4, 2024
And all of that was meant to influence you and influence the 2024 presidential election. And just wait till you see the internal documents describing how these alleged Russian operatives were exploiting u-s based influencers to feed you misinformation and you probably didn’t even realize it.
This is a long video but it is critical that you watch it. So if you don’t have time now, please come back to this when you have a few minutes.
First – it’s not just Russia doing this. Yes alleged Russian operatives are being charged today with federal crimes of money laundering and failing to register as a foreign agent, but the attorney general also pointed out Iran and China have actively been meddling in the November election in similar ways. But as of today DOJ says these alleged Russian operatives worked for RT – which is short for Russia today – a website, in English, available in the united states that provides American news.
So how did they do that? The DOJ says — not just through the RT website and US based influencers – who were not named and the DOJ says they didn’t know they were being paid by the Russians – but they’re also pulling off this misinformation campaign by creating other websites that are actually being run by the Russian government. The attorney general said today the DOJ seized 32 separate domains.
So let’s talk about those internal documents because the Department of Justice released them. They’re titled the “Good Old USA project” “The Guerilla Media Campaign” and the “US Social Media Influencers Network Project.” In black and white the goal is to secure a presidential victory for “candidate a.” While bringing the confidence ratings down for “candidate b.” And to increase the percentage of Americans who believe the US has “been doing way too much to support Ukraine.” But it’s not just limited to Ukraine…these posts were supposed to influence you to be believe that “universal poverty” is coming through record inflation and unaffordable prices. The posts were meant to make you fearful of job loss if you were white. Make you believe that there were outsized “privileges for people of color, perverts and the disabled”. Meant to make you believe political party b was constantly feeding you lies about the “real situation in the us,” to make you believe that there’s a “threat of crime coming from people of color and immigrants” to make you believe that the us government is overspending on foreign policy at the expense of u-s citizens and that the u-s is being drawn into a war.
These messages were supposed to target residents in swing states, in “conservative states where traditional values are strong,” US citizens of Hispanic descent, Jewish Americans and Americans gamers who read reddit boards and are on 4chan.
Look – misinformation is a problem. I just did a whole ted talk about it and how to protect yourself from it. And even if you think you’re safe – you probably are not…misinformation is sneaky. So go and watch that TEDxTalk it’s linked on my profile.
Read more about the charges here.
Read more about the misinformation campaigns here.
