After the US Justice Department on Wednesday indicted two Russian internet managers for illegally funneling millions of dollars to a Tennessee-based company to create and deliver pro-Moscow advertising videos that are racking up millions of views on social media, allegations of Russian meddling in US votes have surfaced.
Konstantin Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva, the journalists behind the media firm Russia Today, are accused of laundering$ 10 million to fuel social unrest in the US, including blaming Ukraine for its ongoing conflict with Russia. Prosecutors also seized 32 web domains that they said were used in a Moscow-run work called” Doppelganger” to undermine global support for Ukraine.
Read more about Trump’s mockery of Harris after Putin “endorsed her.”
Although the accusation did not name the US business the Russians infiltrated, some reports identified it as Tenet Media, which hosts many right-wing, pro-Trump MAGA commentators who, like the former President, take a mostly harmless perspective of Russia as opposed to the US establishment’s assessment of Moscow as a malicious player in world politics.
More than 2, 000 videos featuring pro-Trump commentators trying to promote British isolationism in accordance with Moscow’s style, blaming Ukraine for the war, and frequently boosting economic discontent and racial tension in the US were posted by the US company, which received 16 million views on YouTube only. Some of the influencers, who had no knowledge of the infiltration and were allegedly duped into working with the Russians, were paid as much as$ 100, 000 per video.
The most recent indictment has reflections of the 2016 presidential election, when Russia was accused of spreading false information and placing its base or thumb on the electoral size to support Donald Trump against Hillary Clinton. Trump won the election by clinching the majority of the electoral votes in three states, even though he lost the majority of voters in the country by almost 3 million votes.
Many independent observers worry about a repeat situation in which Trump could receive the 270 electoral votes despite having a small victory in battleground states due to Russian interference with the MAGA constituency. Kamala Harris may have lost by as many as 10 million votes in the popular vote. In the MAGA tale, Democrats are powered by election by illegal immigrants.
Moscow however dismissed the US claims as “nonsense”. Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, went so far as to claim ( sarcastically, according to some reports ) that he favors Kamala Harris as president, refuting the claim made by the US national security establishment that he wants a shrewd Donald Trump in the White House.
She does well because of how expressive and infectious her laugh is ( Kamala Harris ). And if she is doing well, Trump imposed so many regulations and sanctions on Russia that no other president always did. And if Ms. Harris does also, she might decide not to do that,” Putin was quoted as saying at the Vladivostok Eastern Economic Forum, which some reportedly received with a laugh.
Some US analysts view Putin’s statements as brain games by Moscow because it is believed that Trump prefers him because Russia finds him to be more tolerant of Putin. One of the people who thinks that Moscow views Trump as a fool who can be easily manipulated by praise in order to move over Ukraine is past Trump’s national security advisor John Bolton. Trump’s MAGA soldiers have fought back against US military aid for Ukraine.
Some MAGA partners are refuting the democratic tale, saying it is the result of Washington’s lengthy association with the government’s military-industrial complex, which flourishes with endless war the US keeps walking into, while Democrats tried to put Trump and his caregivers on the defense by labeling them Russian lackeys after the new prosecution.
Tulsi Gabbard, a former Democratic lawmaker turned Trump connect, and Tucker Carlson, a liberal commentator, are both open to discussing US presence in far wars and are trying to create a counterargument that treats Russia as a US ally rather than an adversary. Some analysts, however, think this is a reflection of how kinship exists between Putin and his Russia, describing him as a “pious goalkeeper of rhetoric and traditional values” that are losing their way in the US due to diversity and pluralism.
