WTF Just Happened Today

Tuesday, October 8, 2019

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1/ A new bipartisan Senate report found that Russian actors were directed by the Kremlin to help Trump win the 2016 presidential election. The Senate Intelligence Committee released the 85-page report, which is the second volume of the committee’s investigation into election interference by Moscow. The report concludes that Russia deliberately singled out African Americans and the black community as prominent targets of its disinformation and social disruption campaign. "By far," the panel concluded, "race and related issues were the preferred target of the information warfare campaign designed to divide the country in 2016." The report's findings mirror those of former special counsel Robert Mueller's own report from earlier this year, which also found that the Kremlin directed Russian actors to help Trump win in 2016. The Senate report also includes recommendations for Congress: it urges lawmakers to pass new legislation to increase the transparency of political advertisements on social media and calls on Congress to examine "whether any existing laws may hinder cooperation and whether information sharing should be formalized" between U.S. counter-interference efforts. (The Hill / Daily Beast / NBC News / The Independent / Reuters / Washington Post / Politico)

• The Kremlin’s best-known propaganda arm increased its social media activity in the wake of the 2016 election, adding to concerns about foreign meddling in the current 2020 campaign. Activity by the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency "increased, rather than decreased, after Election Day 2016," the report concluded. (Reuters)

• Russia's propaganda campaigns focused heavily on race relations in the U.S., report finds. Using Facebook pages, Instagram content, and Twitter posts, Russian information operatives working for the Internet Research Agency had an "overwhelming operational emphasis on race… no single group of Americans was targeted… more than African Americans." (NPR)

• Senate report says Russian trolls tried to stoke racial divisions long after the 2016 election by exploiting the debate over Colin Kaepernick's decision to kneel in protest against police brutality. Russia's online disinformation campaign extended well beyond 2016 and focused heavily on the NFL kneeling controversy as part of a broader effort to stoke racial tensions. (Business Insider)

• Read the full report from the Select Senate Intelligence Committee. "Russian active m...

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