Tag: Russian election interference

NRA acted as ‘foreign asset’ for Russia ahead of 2016 election: Senate report

AlterNet logoThe National Rifle Association acted as a “foreign asset” for Russia leading up to the 2016 election, according to a report by Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee.An 18-month investigation into the NRA’s Russia ties by the committee’s minority staff, which reviewed more than 4,000 pages of NRA records, found that NRA leaders promised Russians access to U.S. officials in exchange for Russian business.

The probe found that NRA officials used the organization’s financial resources, which largely come from member dues, to curry favor with Aleksander Torshin, who was then an official at Russia’s Central Bank, and his deputy, convicted Russian spy Maria Butina.

The investigation found that former NRA president David Keene organized a trip to Russia — despite NRA denials that the trip was officially endorsed by the group — during which Butina and Torshin brought a delegation of NRA officials to Moscow. Keene set up the trip on the promise of business opportunities in Russia, including possible deals with a Russian gun manufacturer that was under U.S. sanctions, according to the report.

View the complete September 28 article by Igor Derysh from Salon on the AlterNet website here.

Did the FBI warn the Trump campaign about Russia?

Washington Post logoRep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.): “Mr. Lewandowski, you were the campaign manager for the president’s campaign when the Obama-Biden administration was notified that there might be efforts by the Russians to interfere with our election. Isn’t that right?”

Corey Lewandowski: “Yes.”

Gaetz: “And can you describe for us the briefing you got as the campaign manager to ensure that our system was resilient and American democracy was protected?”

Lewandowski: “There was no briefing provided by anybody from the Obama-Biden administration, members of the intelligence community or the FBI to our campaign that I — when I was present or during my tenure as the campaign manager.”

Gaetz: “Man, that’s just baffling to me. I mean our democracy is so precious. We have to cherish it. We have to protect it, and yet when the Obama-Biden administration knew that there might be nefarious efforts to interfere or co-opt or in any way disturb our democracy, they didn’t say anything to you. Now, as you sit here today, having watched these facts unfold, do you have any, any rationale as to why maybe the Clapper-Brennan-Comey-Obama-Biden team didn’t want to give the Trump campaign a fair defensive briefing about the threats that we were facing?”

View the complete September 20 article by Salvador Rizzo on The Washington Post website here.

Report: Russians Breached FBI Communications In 2016

In 2016, the Russian government not only interfered in the United States’ presidential election — a fact that has been well-documented in the Mueller report— it also spied on U.S. intelligence within the United States. And according to an investigative report by Zach Dorfman, Jenna McLaughlin, and Sean D. Naylor for Yahoo News, Russian operatives “targeted FBI communications” and successfully “hampered the bureau’s ability to track Russian spies on U.S. soil.”

One of the sources for Yahoo News’ report, a former senior official for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), asserted, “It was a very broad effort to try and penetrate our most sensitive operations.”

On December 29, 2016, the outgoing Obama administration gave almost three dozen Russian diplomats only 72 hours to leave the U.S. and seized two rural estates owned by the Russian government. At the time, Russian officials insisted that those estates were merely vacation spots. But according to Yahoo News’ report, the estates were used for spying — and that spying was so comprehensive that it underscores “U.S. counterintelligence vulnerabilities.”

View the complete September 16 article by Alex Henderson from AlterNet on the National Memo website here.

How disinformation could sway the 2020 election

In 2016, Russian operatives used Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to sow division among American voters and boost Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

What the Russians used to accomplish this is called “disinformation,” which is false or misleading content intended to deceive or promote discord. Now, with the first presidential primary vote only five months away, the public should be aware of the sources and types of online disinformation likely to surface during the 2020 election.

First, the Russians will be back. Don’t be reassured by the notorious Russian Internet Research Agency’s relatively negligible presence during last year’s midterm elections. The agency might have been keeping its powder dry in anticipation of the 2020 presidential race. And it helped that U.S. Cyber Command, an arm of the military, reportedly blocked the agency’s internet access for a few days right before the election in November 2018.

View the complete September 9 article by Paul M. Barrett, Deputy Director, Center for Business and Human Rights, Stern School of Business; Adjunct Profession of Law, New York University, on the Conversation website here.

Democratic Resilience

Center for American Progress logoA Comparative Review of Russian Interference in Democratic Elections and Lessons Learned for Securing Future Elections

Introduction and summary

The upcoming U.S. presidential election will be the first since Russia’s extensive and systematic attack on the 2016 cycle. Unfortunately, the interference campaign did not end on November 8, 2016. Multiple law enforcement filings, intelligence warnings, private sector alarms, and watchdog group reports prove that Russia’s attacks continued throughout the 2018 midterm elections—and continue to this day. Continue reading “Democratic Resilience”

‘You are failing’: Former GOP supporter of Mitch McConnell tears into the majority leader for helping Russia

AlterNet logoWhen well-known former Republicans start goading Mitch McConnell with the moniker that clearly has him enraged, you know Moscow Mitch’s cover is blown. For years he’s been able to keep sliding under the radar, undermining the Senate, flouting the norms and traditions that kept the institution a functioning body, while the wider world paid little attention.

But that’s changed. His enthusiastic enabling of this worst, most dangerous president is one thing that’s breaking his protective shell. So is his refusal to protect the nation from enemy interference in our elections. But his disregard for human life is the last straw for a lot of people. That includes well-known former Republicans like David Weissman, who used to support McConnell, as well as Trump. In an open letter to Moscow Mitch published Wednesday in The Times of Israel, Weissman told him “if you don’t like this nickname, do your job.”

“You are failing the people that elected you to act as Senator, but instead you act as [a] Russian puppet,” Weissman wrote. “You have also blocked bipartisan bills that would protect elections in our country. This gives Russia more opportunities to interfere in our elections.” He writes to McConnell that he is “single-handedly putting our democracy at risk,” and “This is why the people are calling you Moscow Mitch.”

View the complete September 5 post by Joan McCarter from Daily Kos on the AlterNet website here.

Democratic Resilience

Center for American Progress logoA Comparative Review of Russian Interference in Democratic Elections and Lessons Learned for Securing Future Elections

Introduction and summary

The upcoming U.S. presidential election will be the first since Russia’s extensive and systematic attack on the 2016 cycle. Unfortunately, the interference campaign did not end on November 8, 2016. Multiple law enforcement filings, intelligence warnings, private sector alarms, and watchdog group reports prove that Russia’s attacks continued throughout the 2018 midterm elections—and continue to this day.

Every indicator suggests that Russia will continue to be actively engaged in disrupting U.S. democratic processes throughout the 2020 election cycle. Compared with midterms, presidential elections are more tempting because the potential return on investment is much greater. Foreign policy tends to play a larger role in debates, as presidents have a much larger executive say in foreign policy decisions than domestic policy. And in 2020, President Donald Trump, a politician for whom the Russian government has a preference and on whose behalf the Kremlin is willing to intervene, will mostly likely be on the ticket again. Continue reading “Democratic Resilience”

Disinformation is catalyzing the spread of authoritarianism worldwide

AlterNet logoThere’s a segment of the American left that believes we’re in no position to be outraged over Russia’s multifaceted campaign to swing the 2016 election to Trump because the U.S. has meddled in its share of elections in other countries. Setting aside the fact that this is a prime example of the tu quoque fallacy, it ignores the specific context of that intervention. The Kremlin didn’t help elect a generic Republican who is sympathetic to their interests–they worked on behalf of a clownish and corrupt narcissist who has no clue whatsoever about how to govern and has emboldened an ethno-nationalist movement that’s ripping the country apart.

But that argument also fails to grasp that this isn’t just about us. As I wrote for The Nation in 2017, long before Trump descended on that gaudy golden escalator to announce his candidacy with a rant about Mexico sending us their rapists, Russia had honed its tactics in Estonia, followed soon after by attempts, with varying degrees of success, to disrupt the domestic politics of Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Finland, Bosnia and Macedonia.

While those efforts were on behalf of politicians and parties that were seen as advancing the Kremlin’s interests, and weren’t strictly ideological, in most cases they resulted in support for far-right ethno-nationalists.

View the complete August 31 article by Joshua Holland on the AlterNet website here.

Trump says Washington Post should apologize to McConnell over ‘Russian asset’ column

The Hill logoPresident Trump on Tuesday said The Washington Post should apologize to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) after it published an opinion piece titled “Mitch McConnell is a Russian asset” that criticized the senator’s opposition to election security legislation.

“I think The Washington Post is a Russian asset by comparison,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a trip to Virginia.

“Mitch McConnell loves our country. He’s done a great job,” Trump added, noting that he did not read the piece. “If they actually said that, that Mitch McConnell is an asset of Russia, they ought to be ashamed of themselves, and they ought to apologize.”

View the complete July 30 article by Brett Samuels on The Hill website here.

It’s not just the Russians anymore as Iranians and others turn up disinformation efforts ahead of 2020 vote

Washington Post logoA recent tweet from Alicia Hernan — whose Twitter account described her as a wife, mother and lover of peace — did not mince words about her feelings for President Trump: “That stupid moron doesn’t get that that by creating bad guys, spewing hate filled words and creating fear of ‘others’, his message is spreading to fanatics around the world. Or maybe he does.”

That March 16 tweet, directed to a Hawaii congressman, was not the work of an American voter venting her frustration. The account, “@AliciaHernan3,” was what disinformation researchers call a “sock puppet” — a type of fictitious online persona used by Russians when they were seeking to influence the 2016 presidential election.

But it was Iranians, not Russians, who created @AliciaHernan3, complete with a picture of a blonde woman with large, round-framed glasses and a turtleneck sweater. It was one of more than 7,000 phony accounts from Iran that Twitter has shut down this year alone.

View the complete July 25 article by Craig Timberg and Tony Romm on The Washington Post website here.