Tag: Russian trolls

Mueller report exposes ‘Miners for Trump’ as a Russian troll effort

Photo of a coal miner on one poster was actually a lifelong Democrat who died of black lung disease.

In October 2016, Pennsylvania social media accounts promoted “Miners for Trump” rallies around the state with a picture of a gritty coal miner. The rallies coincided with a series of presidential campaign rallies by then-candidate Donald Trump.

It turns out the social media promotions were not created by U.S. coal miners, however. Instead, they were the work of the Internet Research Agency (IRA), a Russian troll farm, according to special counsel Robert Mueller’s recently released report on his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The IRA was the largest of the Russian efforts to help elect Trump to the presidency by manipulating social media. It housed hundreds of professional hackers in one St. Petersburg building, creating thousands of fake posts and comments a day.

View the complete April 23 article by Joe Romm on the ThinkProgress website here.

How Russian trolls exploited Parkland mass shooting on social media

The following article by John Kruzel was posted on the PolitiFact website February 22, 2018:

Student survivors from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School participate in a rally for gun control reform on the steps of the state capitol, in Tallahassee, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 21, 2018. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

Russian-linked social media accounts exploited the tragedy at a Parkland, Fla., high school to sow discord and deepen divisions in America.

Russian bots and trolls pushed conspiracy theories about survivors and amplified Second Amendment messaging in an apparent effort to undermine gun control advocacy.

While many Americans are familiar with Russia’s meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, perhaps less well known is Russia’s use of social media to destabilize American society.

“Their playbook is to basically to pit Americans against each other,” Jamie Fly, a senior fellow at the foreign policy think tank the German Marshall Fund previously told PolitiFact. “It’s not even based on party identification, but people on either side of social or cultural divides.” Continue reading “How Russian trolls exploited Parkland mass shooting on social media”