US accuses Russia of spending millions to influence American voters

Russian journalists allegedly conspired to illegally send $10m to a US media company to inject hidden Russian government messaging in a campaign aimed at helping Trump reclaim the White House.

US Attorney-General Merrick Garland speaks to reporters. Picture: AFP.

The Biden administration accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of orchestrating a covert campaign to influence the coming U.S. presidential election and erode international support for Ukraine, blaming the Kremlin for targeting American voters with political propaganda and disinformation.

The influence campaign, which American spy agencies have concluded is aiming to help Republican nominee Donald Trump reclaim the White House, involved Putin’s inner circle and included a scheme to surreptitiously bankroll an American media start-up and direct Russian public-relations companies to promote state-sponsored narratives to influence the presidential race.

The Justice Department announced the seizure of more than 30 internet domains it said were being weaponized by the Russian government to direct malign influence efforts against the U.S. It identified Sergei Kiriyenko, a longtime senior aide to Putin, as overseeing the internet websites, which were designed to appear to readers as leading U.S. news sites but were, in fact, filled with Russian propaganda.

The department also announced charges against two Russian nationals employed at the Russian state-media organisation RT. Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva are accused of conspiring to illegally and secretly send nearly $10 million to a Tennessee-based online media company to inject hidden Russian government messaging across social media to target American audiences. The Treasury Department also levied sanctions on 10 individuals, including RT’s editor in chief, and two entities in conjunction with the alleged election-meddling conspiracy.

FBI Director Christopher Wray arrives for an Election Threats Task Force meeting at the Justice Department. Picture: Getty Images via AFP.

Wednesday’s co-ordinated announcement amounts to the most aggressive effort by the Biden administration to call out foreign election influence activities in the 2024 cycle. Officials in both the Trump and Biden administrations have sought at times to warn the public about attempts to meddle in the election since the 2016 race, which was marred by revelations – many of which came after Election Day – of Russia’s multipronged cyber-interference operation, which also sought to aid Trump.

Russia has historically denied U.S. allegations of election meddling. The Russian Embassy in Washington didn’t respond to a request for comment.

U.S. officials say Russia’s tactics have evolved since 2016, even as its intentions remain largely the same. Speaking at a press briefing Wednesday, Attorney-General Merrick Garland said Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva directed the Tennessee company to contract with U.S.-based social-media influencers to share its content on their platforms.

“The company never disclosed to the influencers or to their millions of followers its ties to RT and the Russian government,” Garland said.

Since launching in 2023, the company has posted nearly 2,000 videos that have received more than 16 million views on YouTube alone, according to an indictment filed in Manhattan federal court.

Russia is seen by U.S. intelligence agencies as the most capable foreign threat to the election, but Iran has also been aggressive this cycle as it has tried to harm Trump’s re-election prospects due to his perceived aggression against Tehran, which included withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal in his first term and assassinating a popular military leader. The Trump campaign revealed last month it had been hacked by what the Federal Bureau of Investigation determined were Iran-linked actors.

China is also engaging in covert influence campaigns touching on the election and seeking to amplify divisions around hot-button issues, officials and disinformation experts say, but not favouring a particular candidate in the presidential race.

US Attorney-General Merrick Garland chairs an Election Threats Task Force meeting at the Justice Department. Picture: Getty Images via AFP.

Top U.S. officials shared a batch of evidence to support their claims that the Kremlin is engaged in an active and aggressive push to influence the November vote in favour of Trump. In a rare move, the Justice Department disclosed internal Russian strategy meeting notes that U.S. intelligence agencies had obtained, which reveal granular details about the Kremlin’s strategy.

One Russian document listed “target audiences” including residents of swing states, such as Arizona and Pennsylvania, Hispanic and Jewish Americans, gamers, and users of the popular social-media site Reddit. It also detailed efforts to create online communities to unite voters who shared perceived Republican values.

Once broadly accepted within American politics and media circles, RT has been in the crosshairs of the U.S. government for several years amid deteriorating relations between Washington and Moscow. The Justice Department required the network to register as a foreign agent in 2017 after U.S. spy agencies linked it to Russia’s interference ambitions in the 2016 presidential contest. Its American broadcaster was banned in the U.S. and elsewhere following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Responding to the Biden administration actions, RT said Wednesday in a mocking email that “2016 called and it wants its cliches back,” and “Three things are certain in life: death, taxes and RT’s interference in the U.S. elections.” “For us, this is not funny,” Garland said in response. He added that advances in generative artificial intelligence and other evolving tradecraft had made Russia increasingly sophisticated in its election-influence operations.

“Therefore, it is a bigger threat than it ever was before,” Garland said. Several government reviews, including a multiyear bipartisan investigation by the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee, concluded Russia interfered in the 2016 election to denigrate then-Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and boost Trump.

Russia is intent on again supporting Trump’s bid to re-enter the White House – as it also was assessed to have done in 2020 – and has sought to undermine the Democratic campaigns of both President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, senior U.S. intelligence officials disclosed in July. The Kremlin-backed influence efforts were described at the time as a “whole of government” operation that relied on covert social-media use and other online propaganda efforts, as well as attempts to target specific voting groups, including swing state voters.

Officials at the time made clear that Russia was the “pre-eminent” threat to the election, as it was seen in past election cycles, due to its decades-old expertise in covert propaganda and its deep desire to undermine politicians – including Biden and Harris – whom it believes will continue to provide vital support to Ukraine’s war effort.

Wednesday’s countermeasures are the second tranche of steps taken by the Justice Department seeking to publicise and undercut the Kremlin’s alleged influence operations. In July, officials announced a take-down of a Russia-linked disinformation bot farm that had been operating on X, formerly Twitter. The bots, numbering nearly a thousand accounts, relied on AI to create bogus user profiles and spammed posts in support of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

U.S. officials said the operation was financed by the Kremlin and organised by an employee of RT who is a member of a Russian intelligence service. It was the first time the U.S. had publicly accused a foreign government of using generative AI technology in support of a foreign-influence operation against Americans, officials said.

Dow Jones