The Dark Web of Russian Influence: How Moscow Manipulates America’s Right-Wing Politics

Midday/Early Afternoon, Tuesday, January 7, 2025, Miami, Florida

For my esteemed friend Jenny:

The Russian Influence on American Right-Wing Politics

Lately, there’s been a lot of talk about how Russia is influencing American politics, especially on the right. Using their GRU intelligence service and the Internet Research Agency (IRA), they’ve managed to tangle up a lot of American right-wing politicians and voters in their web.

A big example of this was during the 2016 presidential election. Donald Trump’s campaign had several connections with Russia, especially through key people like Paul Manafort and Mike Flynn. Manafort, who ran Trump’s campaign, had deep ties to pro-Russian groups and ended up getting convicted for financial crimes linked to his work in Ukraine. Flynn, who used to be Trump’s national security adviser, also got mixed up with Russian officials and lied about his conversations with the Russian ambassador.

But it didn’t stop there. The IRA, a troll farm based in St. Petersburg (Leningrad) backed by the Kremlin, has played a huge role in manipulating American voters. They created thousands of fake accounts on platforms like Facebook and X, pretending to be Americans while pushing pro-MAGA, pro-Russia, and anti-Ukraine messages. These fake accounts have stirred up a lot of trouble, making it really hard for people to tell what’s real and what’s propaganda.

This isn’t a new tactic for Russia. Back in the Soviet era, Kremlin propaganda organs like Pravda often highlighted the contradictions between what America professed to believe—like Jefferson’s “All men are created equal” rhetoric—and the reality many Americans, especially blacks and immigrants from non-European regions, experienced, namely racism and discrimination. Although Soviet propaganda was often clumsy and didn’t have the reach that Putin’s Russia has today, it was based on keen observation of American society and culture. The game changer here, of course, was the Internet.

Reliable Sources:

– [Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_interference_in_the_2016_United_States_elections)

– [The “Neighbors”: The GRU in America, from “Ales” to “Fancy Bear”](https://sites.ecu.edu/cwis/2017/04/the-neighbors-the-gru-in-america-from-ales-to-fancy-bear/)

– [Report to Congress on Russian Military Intelligence](https://news.usni.org/2020/11/27/report-to-congress-on-russian-military-intelligence)

– [What we know about the Internet Research Agency and how it meddled in the 2016 election](https://slate.com/technology/2018/02/what-we-know-about-the-internet-research-agency-and-how-it-meddled-in-the-2016-election.html)

– [Suspended accounts align with the Internet Research Agency misinformation campaign](https://epjdatascience.springeropen.com/articles/10.1140/epjds/s13688-024-00464-3)

– [Manafort shared campaign info with Russian intelligence officer](https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/512526-manafort-shared-campaign-info-with-russian-intelligence-officer/)

– [Senate details Paul Manafort ties to Russian intel officer Kilimnik](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/08/18/senate-details-paul-manafort-ties-russian-intel-officer-kilimnik/3390437001/)

– [A timeline of Michael Flynn’s interactions with Russia that cost him his job] (https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/timeline-michael-flynns-interactions-russia-cost-job/story?id=45456031)

– [Michael Flynn’s Russia Timeline](https://www.factcheck.org/2017/12/michael-flynns-russia-timeline/)

– [Facebook takedowns reveal sophistication of Russian trolls](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/facebook-takedowns-reveal-sophistication-of-russian-trolls)

– [How Russian trolls lie their way to top of Facebook, Twitter](https://www.cnet.com/news/politics/facebook-twitter-social-media-russian-troll-politics-chaos/)