Donald Trump's Putin Plan To Destroy American Democracy

Editor’s Note: The following guest column was written by Wayne Madsen, left, publisher of the Wayne Madsen Report, from which this is excerpted along with background materials in an appendix. Also, Madsen has authored 24 books and is a former Navy intelligence officer who has been a frequent commentator of national security and privacy issues for U.S. broadcast networks and newspapers and their counterparts around the world.

A major focus of his recent investigative journalism has been to document longstanding ties between Russian intelligence operations and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and U.S. Republicans in the inner circle supporting his agendas.

In recent years, he has written also extensively on the threat of Russian interference to other Western democracies and about internal autocracy within the Russian Federation, which he describes as neither “Russian” nor a “Federation” because of Putin’s autocratic rule over oppressed ethnic and religious minorities within the “Federation” borders.

His latest book, “A Parade of New Sovereignties,” to be released in an expanded edition later this week, provides an encyclopedia-style guide to more than 400 such entities contained within the borders of larger nations (including major Western nations) with estimates of the likelihood of independence.

– Andrew Kreig, Justice Integrity Project editor and co-host with Wayne Madsen of the podcast District Insiders.

Then-President Trump welcomes top Russian diplomats, including Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, at Trump’s right, to the White House Oval Office in a ceremony on May 11, 2017, from which Western media were banned (Alexander Shcherbak photo for Tass).

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted 2016 Green Party Presidential Nominee Jill Stein, shown above right, at his table in early 2016 before her vote totals in key states exceeded the margin of victory for Republican Donald Trump, thereby helping enabled his defeat of Democrat Hillary Clinton. Stein, who ran also in 2020 and again this year, was joined at Putin’s table by the Russian dictator’s communications director, Dimitry Peskov, and future Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn (Photo via RT, formerly “Russia Today,” Putin’s state-run propaganda network).

By Wayne Madsen

It is clear from Donald Trump’s rhetoric that what he plans for America’s democracy is a carbon copy of what his mentor and chief influencer, Vladimir Putin, has done to Russia’s once-fledgling democracy. During the first six months of this year, Putin’s regime has sentenced a record number of Russian citizens for espionage, treason, separatism, and “extremism.”

Based on what Trump has said about what he perceives as America’s “enemy within,” a second Trump presidency will sink the U.S. Constitution as he proceeds to imprison his political opponents. Trump has already named those he intends to prosecute on spurious charges and jail: Former President Barack Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and he husband, Paul Pelosi; Representative Adam Schiff, former Republican Representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, and many others.

Trump can be expected to copy Putin in another manner should be become president. Putin routinely bans anything that he does not like. On Putin’s hit list are public protests, media articles critical of his regime, independent judicial bodies, and proselytizing by religions other than the Russian Orthodox Church.

Just as Putin is restoring the symbolism of the Stalinist era throughout Russia, Trump will ensure that U.S. military installations revert back to being named for Confederate generals and that statues honoring Confederates like Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis, shown at left in an 1859 photo, are restored to pedestals in the town squares of cities and towns in the South. Trump’s affection for the Confederacy may see Confederate States of America flags restored to national parks, cemeteries, and national historical sites.

Trump can also be expected to restore the European names originally assigned to geographical locations that are sacred to Native Americans. This includes reverting to the name Mount McKinley for the Denali peak in Alaska and Clingmans Dome for Kuwohi mountain in North Carolina.

Trump will follow the lead of Putin, who recently renamed Moscow’s “Europe Square” to “Eurasia Square.” Putin has also reverted to using Russian names originally assigned in 1820 to locations in Antarctica, including Smolensk for Livingstone Island, Borodino island for Smith Island. Putin is also pressing the Russian city of Volgograd to revert back to Stalingrad amid popular opposition to such a move in the city.

On a much darker note, Trump will order loyal federal agents to carry out the type of defenestrations of his political opponents that are common in Russia for those who have had the temerity to challenge Putin and his regime.

Final Exit Via Windows? (Known as “Defenestration” In Intelligence Circles)

Opponents of Trump who survive defenestration may be sentenced to lifetime of very long prison terms in detention camps. In fact, the establishment of detention camps by Trump is a major element in the Republican platform. In Russia, these camps are found in the harshest of environments, including the Arctic north and Siberia. Trump will be tempted to establish similar detention centers in the humid swamp lands of Louisiana, the unlivable deserts of Arizona and Nevada, and the coldest climes of Alaska.

Many Americans, indeed, are planning on voluntary exile should Trump regain the White House. The question then will be, how many democracies will welcome American political asylum seekers?

Opponents of Trump who survive defenestration may be sentenced to lifetime of very long prison terms in detention camps. In fact, the establishment of detention camps by Trump is a major element in the Republican platform.

In Russia, these camps are found in the harshest of environments, including the Arctic north and Siberia. Trump will be tempted to establish similar detention centers in the humid swamp lands of Louisiana, the unlivable deserts of Arizona and Nevada, and the coldest climes of Alaska.

Many Americans, indeed, are planning on voluntary exile should Trump regain the White House. The question then will be, how many democracies will welcome American political asylum seekers?

Contact the author Andrew Kreig

Related News Coverage

Notes: Wikipedia has summarized recent Russian suspicious deaths in an entry entitled, “Suspicious deaths of notable Russians in 2022–2024.” Among those described are Ravil Maganov, right, chairman of the national oil company Lukoil, who fell from a Kremlin Hospital window under suspicious circumstances, according to reports: CCTV cameras had been “turned off for repairs,” President Putin was visiting the hospital the same day, and associates did not believe he was suicidal.

On June 3, 2022, according to the Wikipedia entry, the Dutch NOS news network described the phenomenon as “a grim series of Russian billionaires, many from the oil and gas industries, who have been found dead under unusual circumstances since early this year. The first was on 30 January, when 60-year-old Leonid Shulman, transport chief for Russian energy giant Gazprom, was found dead in the bathroom of his country house in the Leningrad region.

Oct. 27

Everyone is entitled to my own opinion, Commentary: Washington Post endorses fascism, Jeff Tiedrich, Oct. 27, 2024. The useless press has already capitulated to Elderly Dictator.

Jeff Bezos, the gazillionaire….is not a newspaper guy — he’s a businessman. To him, the Washington Post is just a line-item on a spreadsheet. More importantly, Bezos is also a government contractor. He’s the founder of Blue Origin, the aerospace company behind those dick-shaped rockets.

Hey, you know who else makes dick-shaped rockets? This dude. That’s right, Dickley McBezos and the Space Nazi (above) are competitors.

So he phones up the Washington Post and tells them that’s it, there will be no endorsement of Kamala Harris — and sure enough, twenty minutes after the announcement was made, this happened:

“Former President Trump met with leaders from the Jeff Bezos-owned aerospace company Blue Origin following his speech in Austin, Texas. The Republican had a short meeting with the aerospace company CEO David Limp and vice president of government relations Megan Mitchell, according to The Associated Press (AP).”

Is that a rat you’re smelling right now? Well, you’re in good company. Here’s former Post editor-at-large Robert Kagan, right, who quit his job after the news broke that the WaPo wouldn’t be endorsing Kamala.

“Trump waited to make sure that Bezos did what he said he was going to do, and then met with the Blue Origin people,” he reportedly said.

“Which tells us that there was an actual deal made, meaning that Bezos communicated, or through his people, communicated directly with Trump, and they set up this quid pro quo.”

Bezos’s non-endorsement of Kamala Harris is actually a ringing endorsement of fascism. Capitulating in advance to a bully because you’re afraid of something that might happen is literally how fascism works.

Donny isn’t the president right now. There’s an excellent chance that Donny will never again be president — but Bezos is kowtowing to Donny as if he were already in power.

Here’s a super-fun story about what happens when your country becomes a kleptocracy. In the summer of 2000, good old Vlad Putin summoned 21 of Russia’s richest oligarchs to the Kremlin.

Putin offered the oligarchs a deal: bend to my authority, stay out of my way, and you can keep your mansions, superyachts, private jets, and multibillion-dollar corporations (corporations that, just a few years before, had been owned by the Russian government). In the coming years, the oligarchs who reneged on this deal and undermined Putin would be thrown into a Siberian prison or be forced into exile or die in suspicious circumstances. The loyalists who remained — and the new ones who got filthy rich during Putin’s long reign — became like ATM machines for the president and his allies.

One of the attendees, oil baron Mikhail Khodorkovsky, right, thought Vlad was just blowing smoke. He continued to criticize Putin, and even mused aloud about running against him for president. You’ll never guess what happened next.

In 2003, masked agents stormed Khodorkovsky’s private jet during a refueling stop and arrested him at gunpoint. Authorities charged him with fraud and tax evasion. They imprisoned him in Siberia, where he would languish for the next decade. The government took over his oil empire and handed the keys to one of Putin’s longtime associates, Igor Sechin.

Hey, Bezos, how you would you feel about the Space Nazi taking over all your dick-rockets? Oh, you wouldn’t like that very much? Well then keep your fucking mouth shut and toe the line.

Say what you want about New York Times’ nepo-publisher Arthur Gregg Sulzberger, right — and believe me, I’ve had nothing good to say about him — at least he’s a newspaper guy. He doesn’t have any penis-spaceship companies to worry about.

The Times is proudly endorsing Kamala.

It is hard to imagine a candidate more unworthy to serve as president of the United States than Donald Trump. He has proved himself morally unfit for an office that asks its occupant to put the good of the nation above self-interest. He has proved himself temperamentally unfit for a role that requires the very qualities — wisdom, honesty, empathy, courage, restraint, humility, discipline — that he most lacks.

Daily Beast, Ex-WaPo Editor: This Is a Straight Bezos-Trump ‘Quid Pro Quo,’ Lily Mae Lazarus, Oct. 26 2024. DIRTY DEAL.Robert Kagan tells the Daily Beast that Donald Trump’s meeting with Blue Origin executives the day its founder Jeff Bezos killed his paper’s Kamala Harris endorsement is proof of a backroom deal.LThe Washington Post’s outgoing editor-at-large and longtime columnist has made explosive claims that its owner Jeff Bezos struck a deal with Donald Trump in order to kill the newspaper’s endorsement of Kamala Harris.

Robert Kagan, right, who resigned from his position on Friday after more than two decades at the publication, told the Daily Beast that Trump’s meeting with executives of Bezos’ Blue Origin space company the same day that the Amazon founder had killed a plan to support Harris was proof of the backroom deal. “Trump waited to make sure that Bezos did what he said he was going to do, and then met with the Blue Origin people,” he said on Saturday. “Which tells us that there was an actual deal made, meaning that Bezos communicated, or through his people, communicated directly with Trump, and they set up this quid pro quo.”

The alleged collusion between Bezos and Trump, Kagan says, “is just the beginning” and that if the former president wins a second term, there will be “a lot of self censorship [in the media] and a lot of changing course just to be sure that they’re not going to be punished.”

Kagan became a vocal anti-Trump voice in 2016, writing about the dangers of authoritarianism in the event of a second Trump presidency and how the former president could jeopardize American democracy.

In 2023, Kagan warned about Trump’s potential influence on the media, arguing that “Media owners will discover that a hostile and unbridled president can make their lives unpleasant in all sorts of ways.”

Bezos knows first hand the consequences of criticizing the former president. The Post’s 2016 endorsement of Hillary Clinton is widely thought to have led to him losing out on a $10 billion cloud computing defense contract awarded by the Trump administration. And, throughout the former president’s first term, he repeatedly attacked Bezos and Amazon, accusing them of scamming the United States Postal Service.

Oct. 26

Elon Musk, right, appeared with former President Donald J. Trump on Saturday at a rally in Butler, Pa., the site of an assassination attempt on Mr. Trump earlier this year (New York Times Photo by Doug Mills).

Letters From An American, Commentary: October 25, [Musk Secret Talks With Putin], Heather Cox Richardson, right, historian, author, Oct. 26, 2024.  A bombshell story last night from the Wall Street Journal reported that billionaire Elon Musk, one of the richest men in the world, who is backing the election of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump with a daily million-dollar sweepstakes giveaway and gifts of tens of millions to the campaign, has been in regular contact with Russian president Vladimir Putin since late 2022.

Reporters Thomas Grove, Warren P. Strobel, Aruna Viswanatha, Gordon Lubold, and Sam Schechner said that the conversations “touch on personal topics, business and geopolitical tensions.”

Musk’s SpaceX, which operates the Starlink satellite system, won a $1.8 billion contract with U.S. military and intelligence agencies in 2021. It is the major rocket launcher for NASA and the Pentagon, and Musk has a security clearance; he says it is a top-secret clearance.

Today, NASA administrator Bill Nelson, left, called for an investigation into the story. “If the story is true that there have been multiple conversations between Elon Musk and the president of Russia,” Nelson told Burgess Everett of Semafor, “then I think that would be concerning, particularly for NASA, for the Department of Defense, for some of the intelligence agencies.”

Musk appears to be making a bid for control of the Republican Party for a number of possible reasons, including so he can continue to score federal contracts and because the high tariffs Trump has promised to place on Chinese imports would guarantee that Musk would have leverage in the electrical vehicle market.

But Musk has competition for control of the party. Today, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), right, who lead the establishment Republican faction and the MAGAs, respectively, and thus are usually at loggerheads, issued a joint statement condemning Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris for “labeling [Trump] as a ‘fascist.’” They suggest she is “inviting yet another would-be assassin to try robbing voters of their choice before Election Day.”

Observers immediately pointed out that, in fact, it is Trump who has repeatedly called Harris a fascist—as well as a Marxist and a communist—and that those calling Trump a fascist are former members of his own administration like former White House chief of staff General John Kelly, or leaders like former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, whom Trump himself appointed to his position and who called Trump “the most dangerous person to this country.”

Harris’s contribution to this discussion was that when CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked Harris directly if she thinks Trump is a fascist at a town hall this week, she answered: “Yes, I do. And I also believe that the people who know him best on this subject should be trusted.”

Aside from the gaslighting of attacking Harris for something that Trump is the one doing, the statement seemed a calculated attempt to demonstrate Republican solidarity. But it was glaringly obvious that McConnell and Johnson found that solidarity only in attacking Harris. Their statement contained no praise of Trump.

The struggle over the Republican Party also seemed evident in yesterday’s decision by the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times, biotech tycoon Patrick Soon-Shiong, to kill that paper’s planned endorsement of Harris. Choosing not to make an endorsement in the race, Soon-Shiong said that he thought an endorsement would “add to the division” in the country. Elon Musk praised his decision.

Today the Washington Post also decided not to make an endorsement in the presidential race, despite the fact a piece endorsing Harris was already drafted. Publisher William Lewis said the paper was returning to its roots of not endorsing presidential candidates, although it has endorsed candidates for decades and did so in its early years as well. His statement seemed a weak cover for the evident wish of the Washington Post’s owner, Jeff Bezos, to avoid antagonizing Trump.

Bezos gives Musk a run for his money at being the richest man in the world. But while Musk wants high tariffs against China to protect his access to electric vehicle markets, Bezos’s fortune comes from Amazon, and high tariffs would shatter his business. When he was in office, Trump went out of his way to find ways to hurt Amazon to get back at Bezos for unfavorable coverage in the Post.

Los Angeles Times editorial page editor Mariel Garza, along with journalists Robert Greene and Karin Klein, resigned from the paper after its decision not to endorse Harris, and nearly 2,000 readers canceled their subscriptions. The Washington Post, too, has seen about 2,000 subscribers bow out, and fourteen of the newspaper’s columnists called the decision not to condemn Trump’s threats to the “freedom of the press and the values of the Constitution” “a terrible mistake.” Cartoonist Ann Telnaes published a blacked-out square, playing on the Post’s motto that democracy dies in darkness.

Readers are speaking out against the Washington Post for demonstrating what scholar of authoritarianism Timothy Snyder calls “obeying in advance” the demands of an authoritarian leader (although Washington Post legal journalist Ruth Marcus, who signed the letter calling the decision a terrible mistake, pointed out that the Post itself was publishing the many letters of condemnation). “Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given,” Snyder’s “On Tyranny” reads. “In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.”

The aftermath of the Post’s decision demonstrated what scholars say will happen after such obeying. Rather than winning favors, such a demonstration of weakness invites further abuse, as anyone who has watched Trump in action ought to know by now.

Trump’s people pounced, with advisor Stephen Miller posting: “You know the Kamala campaign is sinking when even the Washington Post refuses to endorse.”

Trump then promptly went a step further, claiming that Democrats had taken part in “rampant Cheating and Skullduggery…in the 2020 presidential election” and warning that in 2024, “WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again…. Please beware that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials. Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.”

Trump’s threats are designed to convince people he is a strongman who will inevitably win the 2024 presidential election. But to do that, he will have to go through the voters, who are demonstrating their enthusiasm for Democratic candidate Harris and her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walz.

After the announcement by the Washington Post, others stepped up to endorse Harris. The largest Teamsters union in Texas endorsed Harris before her rally tonight in Houston. In a blistering editorial, the Philadelphia Inquirer endorsed Harris, saying: “America deserves much more than an aspiring autocrat who ignores the law, is running to stay out of prison, and doesn’t care about anyone but himself.”

Tonight, Trump taped a podcast episode with Joe Rogan in Austin, Texas, hoping to reach Rogan’s large audience. He was still on the ground in Austin when he was supposed to be appearing at a rally in Traverse City, Michigan, and blamed the long taping for the fact he was three hours late to the rally. Tired of waiting, rally attendees streamed out. When he finally arrived, about 47,000 viewers watched the PBS live stream of the rally.

Harris was in Houston, where she took the fight for abortion rights to the heart of a state where an abortion ban has endangered women and driven up the infant mortality rate. People began standing in line before sunrise to get into the rally at the Houston Shell Energy Stadium and filled the 22,000-seat stadium to capacity. About 2.5 million people watched the PBS live stream.

Egberto Off The Record via Spotify, Commentary: Andrew Kreig, Justice Integrity Project Editor, on how the new ‘Lawfare’ and Project 2025 hurt you, Hosted by Egberto Willis, right, Oct. 26, 2024. Justice Integrity Project Editor Andrew Kreig discusses how the New ‘Lawfare’ and planned Project 2025 hurt you. He exposes the dangers of Trump and MAGA.

Kreig, a seasoned journalist and attorney, critiques the manipulation of the justice system to target political opponents, warning that Project 2025 could bring even more severe authoritarian tactics under a conservative administration. Kreig stresses the urgent need for public awareness and action to preserve democratic values against these escalating threats.

Kreig highlights “lawfare” as using legal tactics to attack political adversaries, pointing to cases like Michael Sussmann’s as examples of this dangerous trend.• The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 proposes policies that threaten to expand conservative power, restrict immigrants’ rights, and diminish government accountability.• He warns that Project 2025 will lead to an authoritarian regime with unchecked power, especially concerning deportations and widespread policing.• Kreig warns that the current conservative Supreme Court could endorse these policies, undermining judicial independence and basic civil liberties.• He urges people to vote and engage actively in politics to defend democracy, as Project 2025 will severely restrict freedoms if implemented.

Andrew Kreig’s analysis is a clarion call for all who value justice and democracy to oppose Project 2025’s authoritarian vision. By revealing the conservative agenda to weaponize legal systems against political rivals and restrict rights, Kreig shows how vital it is for progressives to stand united, vote, and advocate for true democratic freedom. His insights warn of a bleak future where authoritarianism could threaten the freedoms many take for granted, making immediate civic action essential.

Hosted by Egberto Willies, this conversation sheds light on the implications of ‘lawfare’—the weaponization of legal processes against political opponents—and the radical agenda encapsulated by Project 2025. Kreig, a seasoned journalist, and attorney, warns that these tactics and policies if left unchecked, could fundamentally erode democratic freedoms, further entrench injustice, and ultimately harm the average American citizen.

In this interview, Kreig uses his career experience covering federal courts and working with Connecticut’s oldest newspaper, The Hartford Courant, to contextualize how far the current justice system has deviated from the ethos he once observed. At its core, Kreig contends that the misuse of prosecutorial power represents a grave threat to democracy, citing cases where questionable legal tactics have been employed to damage reputations and impede political adversaries. He refers to his book, The Complete Annotated Durham Russiagate Report, as a response to what he perceives as widespread misconduct and attempts to cover up the implications of foreign interference in American politics.

The so-called ‘lawfare’ approach leverages legal action as a political weapon. Kreig recounts how those who dared to expose foreign meddling in U.S. elections often found themselves under investigation rather than supported. For instance, he references Michael Sussmann, an attorney involved in the 2016 Clinton campaign, who informed the FBI of potential Russian interference, only to face charges for his disclosure later.

Although Sussmann was acquitted, Kreig argues the intent behind the charges was clear: to discredit anyone willing to challenge the dominant political narrative. He explains that this approach extends beyond individual cases, emphasizing politically motivated prosecutions, often amplified by conservative media outlets eager to bolster narratives favorable to their ideological aims.

While mainstream media outlets may cover these cases, they frequently fail to critically examine them, leaving viewers with a biased or incomplete understanding of events.Kreig’s analysis also highlights how Project 2025 could represent the subsequent significant escalation in conservative legal strategy.

Developed by the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025 is a blueprint for the next conservative administration, intending to reshape the federal government radically.

Kreig notes that Project 2025’s proposals extend well beyond conservative principles, advocating for policies that undermine judicial independence, restrict immigrant rights, and dismantle critical government agencies. These policies, he argues, have the potential to fundamentally alter the fabric of American democracy and restrict the rights and freedoms of marginalized groups, particularly immigrants and political dissidents.One of Kreig’s primary concerns with Project 2025 is its focus on immigration policy, which he views as a pretext for a broader authoritarian agenda.

He references historian Timothy Snyder, who has warned of the authoritarian tendencies inherent in mass deportation policies. If implemented, Project 2025’s proposals could lead to a police state where local authorities would be empowered to detain and deport individuals deemed undesirable, potentially without due process or oversight. This approach not only violates fundamental human rights but also establishes a dangerous precedent for the treatment of American citizens who dissent from the ruling political ideology.

Moreover, Kreig underscores the threat posed by a Supreme Court aligned with these authoritarian policies. He describes the judiciary’s conservative majority as a potential rubber stamp for authoritarian actions, citing recent decisions that have expanded executive power while undermining individual liberties. If the judiciary continues to lean in this direction, Project 2025’s agenda could be unchallenged, rendering democratic checks and balances meaningless.

Kreig warns that if Trump or a similarly authoritarian candidate wins in 2024, they could appoint additional justices sympathetic to this agenda, cementing conservative dominance in the judiciary for decades to come.Kreig’s concerns extend to how these developments will affect ordinary citizens, particularly those from marginalized communities.

He contends that Project 2025’s policies would disproportionately impact people of color, immigrants, and those with progressive political views. By targeting these groups, Kreig argues, conservatives are attempting to consolidate power by disenfranchising potential opposition, creating a political environment where dissent is effectively criminalized. This tactic not only undermines democratic principles but also alienates large segments of the population, making it difficult to achieve meaningful social change.The conversation then shifts to Kreig’s efforts to expose these injustices. He recounts how he has attempted to alert mainstream media outlets to the dangers of politically motivated prosecutions, only to be met with indifference or outright dismissal. He suggests that this reluctance to engage with controversial topics is indicative of a broader issue within American journalism, where financial constraints and corporate interests often dictate editorial decisions. As a result, essential stories that challenge the status quo are frequently overlooked, leaving the public uninformed about the true nature of political developments.

Kreig concludes by urging listeners to take action. He emphasizes the importance of voting, not just as a civic duty but as a means of safeguarding personal freedoms and preventing the rise of authoritarianism. In his view, progressive activists and ordinary citizens must recognize the stakes of the upcoming elections and work together to prevent the implementation of policies that could dismantle the democratic institutions that protect individual rights.

In sum, Kreig’s interview with Egberto Willies (available here on Spotify as well as via other platforms) shows the dangers of unchecked power and the importance of vigilance in preserving democratic values. His insights into ‘lawfare’ and Project 2025 reveal the extent to which conservative forces are willing to consolidate their influence and reshape America in their image. Kreig’s message is clear for progressives and anyone committed to justice: now is the time to act, lest we find ourselves in a society where dissent is punished, and democracy is a distant memory.

Egberto Willies, based in Houston, is a political activist, author, political blogger, radio show host, business owner, software developer, web designer, and mechanical engineer in Kingwood, TX.

Egberto is an ardent Progressive thatbelieves tolerance is essential. His favorite phrase is “political involvement should be a requirement for citizenship”. He believes that we must get away from the current policies that reward those who simply move money/capital and produce nothing tangible for our society. If a change in policy does not occur, America will be no different than many oligarchic societies where a few are able to accumulate wealth while the rest are left out because it is mathematically impossible to catch up. His books include his memoir, “Tributions of an Afro-Latino Caribbean Man: Racism didn’t Stop My Smile, Hope, Or Journey Forward.”

Oct. 25

Wall Street Journal, Elon Musk’s Secret Conversations With Vladimir Putin, Thomas Grove, Warren P. Strobel, Aruna Viswanatha, Gordon Lubold and Sam Schechner, Updated Oct. 25, 2024. Regular contacts between world’s richest man and America’s chief antagonist raise security concerns; topics include geopolitics, business and personal matters.

Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and a linchpin of U.S. space efforts, has been in regular contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin since late 2022. The discussions, confirmed by several current and former U.S., European and Russian officials, touch on personal topics, business and geopolitical tensions.

Wall Street Journal, NASA Head Says WSJ Report of Musk’s Talks With Putin Should Be Investigated, Joseph De Avila and Micah Maidenberg, Oct. 25, 2024. Bill Nelson said the account of multiple conversations between the billionaire and the Russian president was concerning.

Elon Musk’s secret conversations with Vladimir Putin are drawing attention from top leaders at NASA, the space agency that increasingly relies on Musk’s SpaceX to carry out key missions.

Wayne Madsen Report (WMR), Investigative Commentary: BRICS Summit being held in the capital of a Russian-occupied nation, Wayne Madsen, left, Oct. 25, 2024. Tatarstan’s leaders in exile sent an open letter to the leaders of the nations participating in the October 22-24 BRICS Summit in Tatarstan’s capital of Kazan that they were doing so in support of Vladimir Putin’s goal of stamping out the last vestiges of autonomy in the Republic of Tatarstan.

The exiled Tatar leadership also pointed out to the BRICS participants that there “there are 25 enterprises of the defense-industrial complex in occupied Tatarstan, which employ 47,000 people. All these military plants are used by Moscow for the occupation of foreign states. In Ukraine alone, hundreds of thousands of civilians were killed and several cities were bombed with the help of shells made in Tatarstan.”

The Tatars also drew attention to Tatar casualty figures in the war in Ukraine, emphasizing that “the genocide of the Tatar people continues through persistent attraction to contract military service with obviously unfulfillable promises and illegal and violent mobilization. Today, the number of Tatarstan natives who died in the war has already exceeded 3,000 people. We responsibly declare that our native Tatarstan is an occupied territory and all its resources are used by imperial Muscovy without the consent of the Tatar people.”

In summary, the Tatar leaders called on the leaders of the BRICS summit “to distance themselves from the politics of Moscow.”

On another front, Tatar and Bashkir leaders in exile asked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who attended the BRICS Summit, to press Putin on the oppression of Tatar, Bashkir, and other Turkic peoples inside Russia. It is not known whether Erdogan discussed the matter with Putin.On another front, Tatar and Bashkir leaders in exile asked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who attended the BRICS Summit, to press Putin on the oppression of Tatar, Bashkir, and other Turkic peoples inside Russia. It is not known whether Erdogan discussed the matter with Putin.

President Donald Trump, right, with his Chief of Staff John Kelly (Pool photo by Michael Theiler via Getty Images).

New York Times, 13 Ex-Trump Aides Back Kelly’s ‘Dictator’ Warning, Saying Trump Seeks ‘Absolute, Unchecked Power,’ Tim Balk, Oct. 25, 2024. In a letter, the former aides wrote, “For the good of our country, our democracy, and our Constitution, we are asking you to listen closely and carefully to General Kelly’s warning.”

Thirteen former Trump administration officials released an open letter on Friday amplifying warnings from John F. Kelly, Donald J. Trump’s longest-serving White House chief of staff, that the former president would rule like a dictator if he returned to office.

The former officials wrote that they were shocked but “not surprised” after Mr. Kelly, a former Marine general, told The New York Times that Mr. Trump had said more than once that “Hitler did some good things” and had complained that U.S. generals were not sufficiently loyal to him.

“This is who Donald Trump is,” wrote the 13, all “lifelong Republicans,” according to the letter. “Donald Trump’s disdain for the American military and admiration for dictators like Hitler is rooted in his desire for absolute, unchecked power.”

The letter did not describe any of the former officials hearing Mr. Trump speaking glowingly of Hitler, the Nazi dictator who presided over the systematic slaughter of six million Jews and millions of others.

But the letter said its signers had “witnessed, up close and personal, how Donald Trump operates and what he is capable of.”

“The American people deserve a leader who won’t threaten to turn armed troops against them, won’t put his quest for power above their needs, and doesn’t idealize the likes of Adolf Hitler,” the letter said.

In his comments to The Times, Mr. Kelly described Mr. Trump’s appreciation of history as limited, and he recalled attempting to explain to the president why it was problematic to praise Hitler. Still, Mr. Kelly said, Mr. Trump continued to make positive comments about Hitler.

A spokesman for Mr. Trump’s campaign, Steven Cheung, accused Mr. Kelly of fabricating his account in a statement on Friday that also claimed that Mr. Kelly and the former Trump administration officials who signed the open letter were suffering from “Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

In this year’s election, Mr. Trump has described Democrats, some by name, as the “enemy from within” and has contemplated deploying the National Guard to address the threat he claims they could pose.

The letter, organized on Wednesday after Mr. Kelly’s comments were published in The Times on Tuesday, was signed by several outspoken Harris supporters, including two who gave speeches at the Democratic National Convention: Stephanie Grisham, a former Trump White House press secretary, and Olivia Troye, who was an adviser to Mr. Trump’s vice president, Mike Pence.

Other signers included Anthony Scaramucci, who had a memorable 10-day run as communications director in the Trump White House; Brooke Vosburgh Alexander, who was a top aide in the Commerce Department; Alyssa Farah Griffin, who served as Mr. Pence’s press secretary; Mark Harvey and Peter Jennison, who worked on the National Security Council; Sarah Matthews, a former deputy White House press secretary; and Robert Riley, who was the U.S. ambassador to Micronesia.

Three former Homeland Security Department officials also signed the letter: Kevin Carroll, Elizabeth Neumann and Sofia Kinzinger, who is married to former Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, one of the most vocal Republican opponents of Mr. Trump after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Oct. 24

New York Times, Harris Calls Trump a Fascist: 6 Takeaways From Her CNN Town Hall, Reid J. Epstein and Lisa Lerer, Oct. 24, 2024. Kamala Harris called Donald J. Trump a fascist on Wednesday evening, elevating what until recently had been an argument made only in the lower ranks of a Democratic Party that has spent years attacking him as anti-democratic, unfit to serve and a criminal.

Early in a CNN town hall in Pennsylvania, she readily agreed with the host, Anderson Cooper, when he asked whether she believed Mr. Trump met the definition of a fascist. “Yes, I do,” she quickly shot back. “Yes, I do.”

Later, when asked about the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, she jumped into a loaded critique of her rival.

“For many people who care about this issue, they also care about bringing down the price of groceries,” she said. “They also care about our democracy and not having a president of the United States who admires dictators and is a fascist.”

Her comments — which went a step beyond her previous agreement that Mr. Trump was a fascist — were intended to amplify the news this week that John Kelly, Mr. Trump’s former White House chief of staff, said he thought the former president met the definition of the word and worried deeply about the threat a second Trump administration posed to democratic institutions.

Ms. Harris’s attacks on Wednesday evening went largely unanswered: Mr. Trump declined both a second debate and an invitation from CNN to participate in a similar forum.

New York Times, The Little-Known Group at the Center of Trump’s Plan for a Second Term, Ken Bensinger and David A. Fahrenthold, Oct. 24, 2024. America First Policy Institute didn’t even exist four years ago. But it is poised to be more influential than Project 2025 if Donald Trump wins.

Late this summer, a prominent right-wing think tank invited conservatives from around the country to learn how to work in a second Donald J. Trump

New York Times, Sweeping Raids and Mass Deportations: Inside Trump’s Immigration Plans, Charlie Savage, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, Featured Oct. 24, 2024, first published Nov. 11, 2023. If he regains power, Donald Trump wants not only to revive some of the immigration policies criticized as draconian during his presidency, but expand and toughen them.

Wayne Madsen Report (WMR), Investigative Commentary: rump’s Putin plan for American democracy, Wayne Madsen, left, Oct. 21, 2024. It is clear from Donald Trump’s rhetoric that what he plans for America’s democracy is a carbon copy of what his mentor and chief influencer, VladimirPutin, has done to Russia’s once-fledgling democracy. During the first six months of this year, Putin’s regime has sentenced a record number of Russian citizens for espionage, treason, separatism, and “extremism.”

Based on what Trump has said about what he perceives as America’s “enemy within,” a second Trump presidency will sink theU.S. Constitution as he proceeds to imprison his political opponents.

Trump has already named those he intends toprosecute on spurious charges and jail: Former President Barack Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and he husband, Paul Pelosi; Representative Adam Schiff, former Republican Representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, and many others.

The Hartmann Report, Commentary: If We Don’t Break the Cycle, a ‘Trump’ Will Always Lurk in the Shadows, Thom Hartmann, right, Oct. 24, 2024. As long as dark money, lies, and hate dominate politics, the next Trump is inevitable…

Suddenly, it seems, the American mainstream media has figured out, or thinks they’ve been given permission to discuss, the fact that Donald Trump is a fascist. That he literally wants to imprison and even execute his enemies including other politicians like Adam Schiff, Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris and former employees who have betrayed him, including General Mark Millie.

Multiple commentators (including me) have wondered out loud if the defeat of Trump this fall will chasten Republicans and cause the Party to revert to its old “merely corporate and billionaire friendly” form, or if Trump has done permanent damage to the GOP and our system of government and the GOP’s embrace of fascism and its lies will continue long after he’s gone.

Sadly, there’s more than enough evidence for the latter, although crediting (or blaming) Trump for it all is far too facile an argument.

It’s a virtual certainty that four years from now we’ll have multiple Republican candidates trying to “pull a Trump” again. There are at least four reasons, although we’re not without resources to fight back or even prevent such an event.

First, there’s always been an authoritarian strain in American politics, dating all the way back to President John Adams arresting journalists and shutting down newspapers because they dared criticize him. Fortunately, President Jefferson pulled us back from that brink, as historian Dan Sisson and I documented in The American Revolution of 1800.

Second, though, five Republicans on the US Supreme Court put a fascism-friendly time bomb into our body of constitutional law when Lewis Powell wrote the 1978 decision in First National Bank v Bellotti, saying that billionaires and corporate “persons” had a First Amendment right to pour money into politics because, Powell claimed, money in politics was the same thing as “free speech.” That crime was massively amplified when a different set of five Republicans on the Court doubled down on legalizing corruption and bribery with Citizens United in 2010.

As a result, today a large handful of American billionaires have been quite willing to fund Trump’s despotic message because they believe their businesses will prosper and their taxes will stay low under a fascist regime. This shouldn’t surprise us: the long history of fascist movements, dating all the way back to ancient Rome, shows there have always been morbidly rich individuals willing to put their own wealth above the interest of their nations.

Third, the six corrupt Republicans on today’s Supreme Court have clearly thrown in with Trump’s fascist agenda, granting him immunity from crimes committed in office and gutting Section 3 of the 14th Amendment which, unambiguously, says:

“No person shall … hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who … shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

Finally, we see evidence that the GOP could continue to embrace fascism in the simple examples provided every day on national television and in our newspapers. Greasy Republican politicians from Ted Cruz to Lindsay Graham to Mike Johnson happily go on television every week to peddle unctuous lies on Trump’s behalf, essentially endorsing and promoting his brand of 21st century American fascism.

Trump has the advantage — which he used to destroy his Republican opponents in the 2016 primary — of being a remarkably glib lifelong liar, as well as benefiting from the millions NBC spent training and coaching him to perform on television. But, as we can see on any of the Sunday political shows, other members of his Party have been eager to learn and imitate; it’s probably only a matter of time before one emerges with a skill set close or even equal to his.

To prevent a repeat of the close call we’re currently experiencing, America should look back to how we galvanized and mobilized American public opinion against fascism during the era when Mussolini and Hitler were rising to power in Europe and the fascist America First movement was growing here.

We did it once; we can do it again.

Egberto Off The Record, Commentary: CNN’s Jake Tapper calls out Trump, Musk, and MTG as leading conspiracy theory-promoting liars, Egberto Willies, Oct. 24, 2024. Jake Tapper methodically deconstructs the conspiracy theories pushed by Donald Trump, MTG, and Musk and admonishes them for the unpatriotic liars that they are.

Jake Tapper‘s CNN segment exposes the false conspiracy that claimed ABC News provided Kamala Harris with debate questions in advance. This baseless rumor, amplified by anonymous social media accounts, gained traction with the help of high-profile figures like Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Marjorie Taylor Greene. Tapper highlights the dangers of unchecked disinformation, especially when promoted by powerful individuals with large platforms. He connects these falsehoods to a broader effort to undermine trust in democratic institutions and the media.

• Anonymous social media users spread a fabricated claim about Kamala Harris receiving debate questions.
• Donald Trump, Elon Musk, right, and Marjorie Taylor Greene amplified the conspiracy without evidence.
• Marjorie Taylor Greene falsely claimed the “whistleblower” had died in a car crash but later admitted it was untrue while still calling for an investigation.
• The segment underscores how disinformation erodes trust in democracy, media, and science, with potential real-world consequences.

October

Oct. 1

GOP Presidential nominee Donald Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance shown campaigningin Michigan on July 20, 2024.

Proof, Investigative Commentary, J.D. Vance, Donald Trump Jr., Elon Musk, and the Coming Far-Right Fascist Dynasty, Seth Abramson, left, Oct. 1-Sept. 30, 2024. The MAGA agenda goes beyond a four-year second Trump term or a medium-term shift in how America does business. It’s a scheme to ensure your kids and grandkids don’t live in America as you’ve known it.

When Donald Trump chose Ohio senator J.D. Vance as his running mate, journalists took the news one of two ways. Either they harped on all the terrible things Vance has said about his new boss in the past — voluminous but essentially immaterial reportage, as Americans no longer care about hypocrisy unless it scores their “team” political points — or they focused on how little Vance brings to the 2024 Republican ticket.

Yes, Vance has said terrible things about Trump, and yes, he appeals only to the same voters Trump already appeals to and very few others, but is that really the worst that can be said about him? That he supports a national abortion ban, that like Trump he has no interest in keeping Europe free from Russian war crimes, and that much like his new political patron he’s a sort of rich author and entrepreneur with ties to the sketchiest billionaires in America, one who talks a good game about identifying with the American working class but doesn’t support any policies that would benefit them?

All this is true — and would be more surprising and troubling in a world where the 2024 Republican presidential nominee wasn’t a confirmed rapist, a 34-times-convicted felon, a serial sexual predator, a serial philanderer, a man who currently owes nearly half a billion in civil fines for the torts he’s committed, a traitor to the United States, a defendant in pending criminal cases in Georgia and D.C. and an unindicted criminal co-conspirator in at least three jurisdictions (New York, Arizona, and Michigan), a man who told over 30,500 provable lies when he was president, and… need we go on?

Must we add in all the middle-class contractors he screwed out the money he owed them after they’d done the work for him their contracts required? His admission that he won’t pay overtime, contrary to federal law? The six bankruptcies? All the foreign dictators he does business with? His historic two impeachments (I, II)? Violations of the Emoluments Clause? His injection of violent and racist rhetoric into U.S. politics to a degree not seen since the Civil Rights Era? The Trump University scam? How about his stealing from charities? Calling American soldiers “losers” and “suckers”?

The point is, these and other atrocities that were introduced to our national political discourse by Trump launching a political career — and this list is by no means close to exhaustive — positively dwarf anything that could be said about Trump’s running mate, so how much does the latter category of content move the political needle for anyone?

It’s all weaksauce — as clearly MAGA voters broadly writ, and a significant percentage of the white working class in American specifically, decided years ago (with the Tea Party) that Democrats supporting policies that benefit them is far less important than Republicans saying they do. Why? Because these voters have reasons for supporting Republicans that they simply don’t want to talk about. In some instances what’s in play are cultural debates or religious dogma, but often enough it’s something darker.

Is the mysterious missing piece here a swirling maelstrom of latent racism, misogyny, antisemitism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, ableism, and/or Islamophobia?

Sure, for some MAGAs it probably is.

Is it that these voters categorically do not read the mainstream news outlets governed by tried-and-tested journalistic ethics, digesting instead a steady diet of disinformation each day that perverts their understanding of our world? Sure, that’s definitely one of causes of the false consciousness the Republican establishment has engendered in the working class. Do some MAGAs vote against their interests because of peer pressure (including familial pressure), lack of any political news consumption at all, a nihilistic bent, the treatment of politics as entertainment rather than consequential policy, or another eldritch causal chain political scientists habitually miss? Surely a possibility.

But whatever the reason for nearly half of Americans being willing to vote for literally the least qualified presidential candidate in American history — yes, going back to the Founding — nothing media has been saying about J.D. Vance is going to change that, whether it’s his bizarre opining on “childless cat ladies” or his general stiffness in all social settings. Sure, these elements of Vance’s political persona could act as a GOTV (“Get Out the Vote”) goosing for the Democratic Party, but they’re not shifting votes.

Candidly, running-mate picks rarely do—even if Vance is one of the least popular ever.

Vance would, if he ever became President of the United States, do more or less exactly what Trump has and (if re-elected) will again: sell naked populism to the masses while spending his time in office blocking every Democratic bill intended to make life fairer and better for the non-rich. While Vance, unlike Trump, is a military veteran, his time in the Marines was spent in comms—so he wasn’t the Hollywood-style killing machine Trump cartoonishly likes to imagine all American soldiers as. Certainly, if Trump has never been hurt politically for being a notorious draft-dodger, and if he already has significant support in the military and law enforcement (which appears to be the case, though it makes no sense given that he has contempt for our troops and is a criminal), there’s no clear way in which Vance’s service significantly advantages the GOP ticket.

So if Mr. Trump didn’t need Vance on the ticket for what many journalists now oddly insist he helps with — the working-class vote in President Biden’s fabled “blue wall” of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, where any MAGA voters are already as sure Trump is in their corner as historians are that the man has no interest in helping them whatsoever — what, exactly, did Trump want Vance for? It certainly isn’t nothing.

The answer may surprise you. And it should certainly unnerve all of us. Because it has nothing to do with this election cycle, and everything to do with the future of America.

Behind the Vance Pick

Sharp readers will notice that one aspect of J.D. Vance’s still wholly theoretical appeal as a politician hasn’t been mentioned yet: his relative youth. (He’s only forty years old.)

This may be of importance to Trump — though likely not for the reason you’re thinking.

September

Spy Talk, Mistakes were made (CNN): A New Account from Inside the Mueller-Trump Probe, Michael Isikoff, below right, Sept. 30, 2024. Prosecutors detail what went right and wrong in the Russia investigation,

In early June, 2014, a shadowy outfit in St. Petersburg—controlled by the notorious pro-Putin oligarch and warlord, Yezgeny Prigozhin (shown above) — dispatched a pair of operatives to the United States on a secret mission.

Posing as American citizens, the operatives traveled through nine states—scouting sites for political rallies, taking photos, and talking by burner phones. When they returned, they filed an intelligence report–the blueprint for an extraordinary “active measures” campaign to bamboozle the American public that would come to full fruition two years later during the 2016 presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Amid mounting signs that the Russians this year have returned and updated their active measures playbook—while the Iranians and Chinese pursue their own versions— it is instructive to revisit just how extensive and creepy the initial Prigozhin disinformation campaign was.

Operating under the deceptively bland name of the Internet Research Agency, an army of trolls created phony Twitter bots and Facebook pages that pumped out thousands of scurrilous messages aimed at riling up U.S. voters, promoting the idea of election fraud and deriding the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. “JOIN our #HillaryClintonForPrison2016,” read one sample missive.

Prigozhin’s online minions also organized and helped pay for political rallies to benefit Trump, who by then had become the clear Kremlin favorite. “THANK YOU for your support Miami! My team just shared photos from your TRUMP SIGN WAVING DAY, yesterday!” Trump wrote after one such rally, unaware this outpouring of support in south Florida had been arranged by Russian operatives thousands of miles away.

“It was a remarkable feat,” write Aaron Zebley, James Quarles, and Andrew Goldstein, three former prosecutors for special counsel Robert Mueller, in their new book, Interference: The Inside Story of Trump, Russia and the Mueller Investigation. “IRA operatives— sitting at their desks in St. Petersburg, Russia—planned and advertised rallies at specific U.S. locations, invited Americans to go there and wave banners the IRA had purchased, and then handed off logistical responsibilities for the event to real Americans.”

One of the virtues of Interference is that it serves as a timely reminder of a brazen threat to American elections that, with the advances of AI and Deep Fake technology, is only getting more menacing by the day. Indeed, Mueller himself underscores the point in a brief preface to the book, in which he revives warnings he tried to give in his halting, ill-fated testimony to Congress in 2019. “Americans have not learned the lessons of Russia’s attack on our democracy in 2016,” he writes. “We were not prepared then, and despite many efforts of dedicated people across the government, we are not prepared now.”

But the book also illustrates the set of daunting challenges the Mueller team had in trying to cabin the malign election activity it uncovered into criminal cases that could hold up in court. Consider the IRA troll farm and its efforts to boost Trump over Clinton. In Feb. 2018, Mueller’s office indicted the IRA, Prigozhin and 18 of his employees, as well as two parent companies also controlled by the oligarch, charging them with a conspiracy to defraud the United States.

Sept. 25

Politico Magazine, Commentary: Russian Disinformation Is Spreading. Europe Could Learn From the US, Mark Scott, Sept. 26, 2024 (print ed.). The real way to fight election interference: Ongoing tension exists between EU countries about how hard to blunt the threat from Russia and Russian President Vladimir Putin, and no criminal sanction powers are available under the bloc’s new digital rulebook.

In the ongoing battle to combat Russian election interference, Washington just showed Brussels what real enforcement looked like — and it didn’t take glitzy new social media rules to hobble Moscow’s global disinformation machine.

First, the Justice Department seized and shut down scores of Kremlin-backed websites that pretended to be those of American outlets like the Washington Post and Fox News to peddle clandestine Russian propaganda at U.S. voters. Then, the Treasury Department sanctioned high-profile Russian officials, including the editor-in-chief of RT. The Justice Department indicted two separate Russians for funneling $10 million into a Tennessee-based company that produced millions of social media posts that spewed Russian disinformation directly into people’s smartphones.

Europe hasn’t done anything close to that — despite Russia also targeting countries across the Atlantic with similar covert tactics.

It’s a reminder that while the European Union has long championed itself as the global frontrunner on digital rulemaking to combat the Russian threat, it’s struggling to keep pace with the United States when it may matter most.

The EU boasts recently passed social media laws, known as the Digital Services Act, that empowers local authorities to force the likes of Facebook and TikTok to take down foreign efforts that undermine elections. If not, companies may face hefty fines of up to 10 percent of their global revenue. The message from Brussels: Big Tech needs to get tough on how Russian disinformation reaches Europeans, or else.

But European officials have moved slowly to thwart Russia’s foreign interference.

In April, Europe’s executive branch, known as the European Commission, opened an investigation under its new social media laws into how Meta had allowed Russian-backed fake news websites to flourish. The Kremlin had created sites pretending to be European outlets like Germany’s Der Spiegel and France’s Le Monde that targeted Europeans, often via social media ads bought on Facebook and Instagram.

Russia’s global operation, dubbed ‘Doppelganger,’ targeted Americans as well as Europeans, and was first discovered in 2022. It involved scores of spoofed news outlets’ websites, including that of POLITICO, though the efforts didn’t always garner traction with social media users.Ursula Von der Leyen looks on as she arrives for a meeting.

In April, the European Commission, led by Ursula von der Leyen, opened an investigation under its new social media laws into how Meta had allowed Russian-backed fake news websites to flourish. | Pool Photo by John Thys

“If we suspect a violation of the rules, we act,” said Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, when the Meta probe began. “Big digital platforms must live up to their obligations.”

Fast forward to September, and Europe’s enforcement remains patchy, at best.

Meta says it is complying with Brussels’ ongoing probe, but the investigation is still months away from completion. Many of the faked European news sites — still spreading Russian disinformation about Ukraine and Europe’s socio-economic woes — are readily accessible to locals, and are widely shared on platforms like X and Facebook.

So far, no one has been arrested for the covert activities.

In contrast, U.S. federal law enforcement hit Moscow where it hurts the most: its ability to reach Americans with covert propaganda ahead of the upcoming presidential election.

The Department of Justice shut down 32 faked Russian websites, and Kremlin officials have either been sanctioned or indicted. Unlike Brussels’ reliance on new digital rules, Washington fell back on decades-old laws, including arcane trademark rules, to root out the attempted interference and hold individuals to account, immediately, for their role in the clandestine activity.

“The Justice Department’s message is clear,” said Attorney General Merrick Garland in announcing the indictments. “We have no tolerance for attempts by authoritarian regimes to exploit our democratic system of government.”

These tactics are not perfect. It’s likely Russia’s efforts to skew November’s election are wide-ranging and ongoing, despite the recent takedowns and indictments. Almost all the Kremlin officials remain out of reach of U.S. law enforcement and will not be affected by the recent sanctions.

Yet Washington succeeded where Brussels — and its new social media rulebook — has not because it targeted the cause, not the symptom, of foreign interference.

The federal government took aim at Russia and its agents, kneecapping direct efforts to interfere in the country’s democratic institutions in one fell swoop. It didn’t need social media rules to do that. The U.S. could rely on existing sanctions against foreign meddling in local affairs.

Brussels, in contrast, targeted its investigation on Meta. It was a move that avoided direct pushback against Moscow to focus on how Putin’s lies reached people via social media.

This difference in enforcement is partly due to larger political problems.

Ongoing tension exists between EU countries about how hard to blunt the Russian threat, and no criminal sanction powers are available under the bloc’s new digital rulebook.

Yet, it also stems from decisions made by the EU on where to focus its resources. Alongside Russian interference, the bloc’s enforcers are also probing social media companies’ protection of minors and their willingness to open their internal data to outsiders in the name of transparency.

The contrast — with U.S. authorities thwarting an immediate threat, and European officials struggling to contain similar Russian covert interference — should be remembered by those in Washington that lament, “Why can’t Congress do that?” when they see Brussels enacting digital rules.

Europe’s new social media laws do hold many of Silicon Valley’s biggest names to account like never before. But when confronted with a foreign government actively trying to subvert November’s election, U.S. officials already had the legal powers — and, more important, the willingness — to act.

 Mark Scott is a senior resident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab where he oversees the think tank’s comparative digital policy work. His newsletter, Digital Politics, publishes each Monday.

Tayler Hansen, above, a member of the Tenet Six, has not been charged with any crime, and is presumed innocent. Proof does not have special knowledge of the FBI investigation of his activities beyond what appears below or is linked to in this report—and this report doesn’t accuse Hansen of committing any state or federal offenses, only urges investigators to continue to review his past conduct as appropriate.

Index: The Tenet Six Series at Proof

• Part 1: The Tenet Six Member Who Was Most Active on January 6 Is the Only One No One Is Talking About (September 9, 2024)
• Part 2: Is Donald Trump Having An Affair With Laura Loomer? Here’s Everything We Know (September 13, 2024)
• Part 3: The Trump-Loomer Scandal Has Just Taken An Unbelievably Dark Turn (September 16, 2024)
• Part 4: The Story of Kremlin-Paid Tenet Six Member Tayler Hansen Just Opened Up a New Nightmare for America (September 21, 2024)
• Part 5: Elon Musk’s Father Just Gave a Terrifying 90-Minute Interview That Confirms Musk As a Major Threat to the United States (forthcoming this month)

Proof, Investigative Commentary, The Tenet Six, Part 4: The Story of Kremlin-Paid Tenet Six Member Tayler Hansen Just Opened Up a New Nightmare for America, Seth Abramson, left, Sept. 21-22, 2024. The Tenet Six member present for more components of January 6 than anyone told HBO one thing about what he witnessed, then altered his testimony in ways that now profoundly endanger the United States. 

How do you start a civil war?In 1860, the answer was Secession Acts, a South Carolina blockade, and cannon fire.

In 2020, the theory pursued by Donald Trump and his top allies was that a single lie would do it. But they made a mistake: they put their “Big Lie” mostly to politicians, courts, local elections officials, and one another, and for weeks and weeks after the 2020 U.S. presidential election that got them nowhere. By the time they realized that the best way to destroy American democracy is with a single lie funneled directly and repeatedly into the eardrums of tens of millions of low-information American voters susceptible to mass foreign and domestic disinformation, it was too late; while they were able to attract 100,000 people to Washington, D.C. on January 6, 2021, the reality is that only a fraction of that crowd was ever going to be both armed and willing to criminally trespass on the grounds of a then-closed, off-limits United States Capitol to try to block a peaceful transfer of power. The bodies and the arms simply weren’t there for a successful insurrection.

Trump needs a new plan. And he has one.

The New Plan Is Not the Same As the Old Plan

The January 6 domestic terrorists and their affiliated MAGA leaders and influencers—including many who did nothing at all illegal with respect to the Trump Insurrection—learned a great deal from January 6, 2021.

Mainly, they learned the following things:1. It’s possible for a coup plot to rely almost exclusively on non-criminal conduct;2. words have such tremendous power that a single lie, properly framed and well-distributed by the right influencers, can bring down a government;3. any plan that centralizes paramilitary actions ought not focus those actions on just a single location, and shouldn’t restrict those actions to a single date;4. MAGAs are willing to believe anything they’re told if they want it to be true; and5. a far greater percentage of coup-related activity should be delegated to state GOP leaders, who are more radical and less scrupulous than elected federal officials, and if possible an even greater share than that must be delegated to local activists, who are even more radicalized and audacious in comparison to state GOP leaders.

It should go without saying that all of this is information that the intelligence services the Kremlin is using to interfere in the 2024 U.S. presidential election already know.

The question—at least, prior to the Tenet Indictment —was whether Putin and the Kremlin were willing to weaponize this knowledge in 2024, knowing that Trump was out of power and that no federal resources would be his to spend in a coup plot.It appears they are.

What the Kremlin needs to see happen if it wants to destabilize the United States in a way related to the 2024 U.S. presidential election, and what Donald Trump needs to see happen if he loses his re-election bid this November and decides not to flee the country but find a way to sow widespread unrest in America such that his arrest or imprisonment on pending criminal cases becomes a logistical impossibility, is that a very big lie must be spread by the right influencers as early as possible—and that lie must be accompanied by as convincing a stockpile of wholly fake evidence as possible.

The combination of these two things—and the chaos they’re capable of producing—must work its way through American culture quickly and organically, speeded on by the fact that the GOP is now no more than a cult of personality marked by antisocial and scofflaw tendencies. That’s how the current insurrectionist thinking goes in 2024.Proof readers won’t be shocked to hear any of this.

New York Times, How the Kremlin Finds Ways to Spread Its Messages, Neil MacFarquhar, Sept. 22, 2024 (print ed.). Social media companies may try to ban RT, the Russian state media broadcaster. But it has proved to be a wily adversary when faced with efforts to silence it.

Major American social media companies sometimes describe the task of identifying disinformation or other malevolent material pushed online by state actors as an endless game of cat and mouse.

This week several of them made a significant play in that game by booting RT and its related Russian state-owned media network off their platforms, a move that in the short term will sharply reduce the network’s audience numbers, media analysts said. But the Kremlin, when thwarted in the past, has quickly devised new ways to get its message out, they noted, and RT can move to other outlets for distribution.

Take what happened just two years ago, when Canada and the European Union banned RT outright. Viewership in different countries for channels like RT Deutsch and RT France immediately cratered, but within days new pages appeared that exactly mirrored RT under different, unrelated names that were not blocked and popped up in internet search results, experts noted.

“This does not collapse their audience,” said Bret Schafer, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund, referring to the new ban. He cowrote a report examining the continued spread of RT content after the earlier ban, which was prompted by Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. “If you are a really hardcore RT follower, you’ll find a way to access it,” he said, “What this really hurts is their ability to span platforms, to reach new audiences, to get in front of people who are not actively seeking out RT.”

Recent Headlines On Foreign Threats To U.S. Voting

• New York Times, U.S. Accuses Russia of Using State Media to Influence 2024 Election, Julian E. Barnes, Glenn Thrush and Steven Lee Myers
• Proof, Investigative Commentary, The Tenet Six, Part 4: The Story of Kremlin-Paid Tenet Six Member Tayler Hansen Just Opened Up a New Nightmare for America, Seth Abramson
  New York Times, How the Kremlin Finds Ways to Spread Its Messages
• Lance Rosen’s Substack, Commentary: “My Pillow” CEO Mike Lindell Comes Out As Full Nazi, Selling His Junk Pillows For $14.88 Each, Lance Rosen
• Washington Post, U.S. says Russian state media outlet runs intelligence operations
• Meidas Touch Network, Commentary: Trump Amplified TENET Media Personalities to Boost Campaign, J.D. Wolf

Sept. 24

Wayne Madsen Report (WMR), Warning: Russia is once again attempting to rig a U.S. election, Wayne Madsen, left, Sept. 24, 2024. Multiple intelligence agencies have closely monitored and analyzed Russian interference in elections in democratic nations and have concluded that Russian intelligence has prioritized targeted electoral systems based on a series of factors.

The 2024 U.S. election is just as vulnerable to Russian and other malign meddling as in past years. What makes 2024 different is that the Russians can now rely on a number of far-right Donald Trump-supporting conspiracists who have taken control of election machinery in quite a number of election jurisdictions throughout the United States.

Russian election interference has not changed in any major respect and it continues to employ three methodologies.

1) Interference that targets election infrastructure and voter turnout. Attempts by Trump loyalists to suppress voting this year in Georgia, Texas, Arizona, and other states fits right into this Russian tactic.

2) interference in the information environment by flooding the information sphere, including social media, with disinformation. Elon Musk’s X (former Twitter), TikTok, Instagram, Telegram, WhatsApp, and Facebook (and to a lesser extent Blogspot and LiveJournal) are once again at the forefront of spreading Russian-made disinformation that favors Trump and his Republican loyalists and disparages Democratic candidates.Russia is relying on artificial intelligence to enhance its disinformation campaign targeting 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris with bogus photos, video, and audio, as well as the traditional phony textual news stories. Prior to President Joe Biden withdrawing from the 2024 race, he was the target of a vicious Russia-led and influenced social media campaign that questioned his mental and physical capacities.

3) Erosion of public trust in governments, political leadership, and public institutions. This includes questioning election officials, Secretaries of State of Michigan, Maine, Georgia, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, canvassing boards, and voter registration officers. Russia is suspected of launching hard-to-trace “swatting calls” to U.S. election officials. A swatting call is from someone who calls 9-1-1 or another emergency number to convey to law enforcement that a non-existent crime is occurring at a given address. Police SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) teams respond to such calls with guns drawn and ramming devices to break down doors. Artificial intelligence has permitted Russian and other malign actors to imitate the voices of swatting call victims. Overall, Russia and China, in disrupting all facets of the democratic electoral process, are seeking to erode public support for democracy.

Sept. 13

Washington Post, U.S. says Russian state media outlet runs intelligence operations, Catherine Belton, Sept. 13, 2024. The State Department accuses RT, the Russian media outlet, of running intelligence operations and procuring weapons for the war in Ukraine.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Russian state media company RT is being deployed by the Kremlin to conduct cyberintelligence and covert influence operations across the globe as well as to help procure weapons for Russia’s war against Ukraine.

State Department officials warned Friday that the newly exposed covert Russian disinformation operation to influence public opinion in the United States represents only a small fraction of Moscow’s efforts to undermine democracies globally through its state propaganda arm RT.

Announcing new sanctions against RT’s parent companies, Rossiya Segodnya and TV-Novosti, that aim to cripple funding for RT and its operations, Blinken said new information showed that these entities “are no longer merely fire hoses of Russian propaganda and disinformation. They are engaged in covert influence activities aimed at undermining American elections and democracies, functioning like a de facto arm of Russia’s intelligence apparatus.”

The sanctions, which come in addition to last week’s Treasury Department actions against 10 top RT executives and its designation of RT as a “foreign mission,” were not an action against the state outlet for the content of its reporting, the State Department said, but were aimed at its covert influence campaigns.

“Covert influence activities are not journalism,” the State Department said in a statement. “The United States will always stand for freedom of expression.” Unlike the European Union, which banned RT in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the United States had previously required RT only to register as a foreign agent.

Blinken said the United States, together with the British and Canadian governments, would instruct its diplomats to inform governments about RT’s expanded capabilities and was calling on “every ally, every partner” across the globe to treat the activities of RT “as they do other intelligence activities within their borders.”

The head of the State Department’s Global Engagement Center, James P. Rubin, likened the diplomatic outreach over RT to the campaign the Trump administration waged against Huawei, the Chinese telecommunications provider, over fears that it could be used to gather intelligence.

RT has become increasingly entrenched as a channel voicing Kremlin propaganda in Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, and it has gone underground to operate through a web of front companies in the West, according to RT’s editor in chief, Margarita Simonyan.

In comments posted on Telegram, Simonyan responded to Blinken by saying, “We have done this, are doing this and will do this.”

In an interview Sunday with Russian state television, Simonyan mocked U.S. claims that RT got its orders from the Kremlin, saying: “All the employees of RT and the editor in chief only obey the orders of the Kremlin! All other orders are toilet paper!”

Sept. 12

Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted 2016 Green Party Presidential Nominee Jill Stein, below right, at his table in early 2016 before her vote totals in key states exceeded the margin of victory for Republican Donald Trump, thereby helping enabled his defeat of Democrat Hillary Clinton. Stein, who ran also in 2020 and again this year, was joined at Putin’s table by the Russian dictator’s communications director, Dimitry Peskov, and future Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn (Photo via RT, formerly “Russia Today,” Putin’s state-run propaganda network).

Wayne Madsen Report (WMR), Investigative Commentary: Russia’s dangerous fifth column threatens democracy, Wayne Madsen, Sept. 12, 2024. Fascist governments have always relied on fifth columns abroad in furtherance of their geopolitical, military, and propaganda aims. Russia, in pursuing a policy to restore the Russian Empire with all the trappings of the Soviet Union, has decided that recruiting fifth columnists in countries ranging from Georgia and Moldova, in what Vladimir Putin considers Russia’s “near abroad,” to Great Britain and the United States will achieve Moscow’s ultimate goal of becoming a political superpower.

The term “fifth column” was actually crafted by Nazi Germany in 1936 to describe General Francisco Franco’s maneuvering of fascist forces in Spain, which were supported by Germany, during the Spanish civil war. A secret German diplomatic telegram from the German chargé d’affaires in Alicante to Berlin stated that Franco had four fascist columns approaching Madrid while a fifth column on standby within the Spanish capital was waiting for the order to launch an attack from inside the city. Although there is an argument among historians about the term fifth column (quinta columna in Spanish) being coined by Franco or one of his top generals, Emilio Mola, the term has generally been used to describe the presence of fascists, Nazis, and other far-rightists within nations for the purpose of destabilization.

Prior to and after America’s entry into World War II, fifth columnists were considered to be Axis power agents within the United States ready to commit acts of espionage and sabotage on behalf of Germany, Italy, and Japan.

In August 1940, The New York Times reported the presence of fifth columns working on behalf of fascist puppet regimes in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Norway, and the Netherlands. The Nazi regime of Vidkun Quisling in Norway introduced the term “quisling” into the lexicon. It meant a traitor or collaborator of the Nazis. Fifth columnists and quisling became paired terms in describing fascist takeovers of democratic nations.

Ever since Russia’s interference with the 2016 Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom and the U.S. presidential election that same year, Russia’s agents of influence abroad have been termed fifth columnists for the Kremlin. Far-right commentator Tucker Carlson has been called a fifth columnist for his lavish praise of Putin and Russia. Donald Trump also stands accused of being a fifth columnist.

The recent allegation by former acting director of the FBI Andrew McCabe, right, that Trump is likely a long-term asset of Moscow has lent credence to the belief that Trump has been and is a fifth columnist for Russia.

Today, Russia commands the most dangerous fifth column abroad since the days of Nazi Germany and the Axis. It includes techno-billionaires like Elon Musk, who bought Twitter to spread fascist propaganda, and Peter Thiel, who has bankrolled Trump, his vice presidential running mate Senator JD Vance of Ohio, and Hitler admirer Blake Masters of Arizona, a failed U.S. Senate candidate. Others involved in building up Russia’s fifth column abroad includes those who helped Musk procure the funding to acquire Twitter, including rapper Sean “Diddy” Combs; Silicon Valley Trump-supporting billionaire investors Larry Ellison, Marc Andreessen, and Bill Ackman; and even more alarmingly, two Russian billionaire oligarchs — Petr Aven and Vadim Moszkowicz — who are close to Putin.

Just as was the case with Nazi Germany financing far-right publications in the United States prior to December 1941, the Kremlin was caught by the FB Ifinancing far-right social media influencers via a Tennessee company called Tenet Media. Tenet (with its principals shown above) received funding, including via cryptocurrency payments, from Russian shell companies that included the Social Design Agency (SDA), Structura National Technology (STRUCTURA), ANO (Autonomous Non-Profit Organization) Dialog, Dialog Regions, and Reliable Recent New (RNN).

The Russian scheme — known as Doppelganger — to finance right-wing fifth columnists relied on 32 internet domains, all of which have been seized by the U.S. government. The Russians ran three social media “guerrilla” operations designed to influence the 2023 election on behalf of Republicans. They were called “The Good Old U.S.A. Project,” “Guerrilla Media Campaign in the United States,” and the “U.S. Social Media Influencer Network.”

Using American and other social media influencers, the Kremlin’s disinformation and disruption campaign according to Russian documents is focused on producing and disseminating “fake videos, documents, and telephone conversations recordings; comments on social media; news and pseudo-news; analytical materials; memes, caricatures, gifs; ‘augmented reality’ materials; fake and real quotes from influencers; songs, cartoons, and animation; [and] creating chats/groups to accumulate the number of participants in the conflict, etc.”

The aforementioned tactics rely on “media mirrors outlets; foreign and Russian influencers; bots and work with comments; groups on social media, Telegram channels; YouTube and other video hosting sites, etc.”

Russian fifth column campaigns include activities directed at stirring up hostility between Ukrainian refugees and host nation populations, including members of the Armenian diaspora in France; stirring up trouble between Muslim communities in Germany and France and Ukrainian refugees in those nations; accusing the German government of suppressing far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) supporters by accusing them of participating in an attempted coup against the federal government; stirring up labor protests in France against the government; falsely suggesting that Poland is demanding World War II reparations from Germany; pushing the false narrative of Nazism in modern Ukraine and sowing fear of it across Europe and the world; create false stories about the U.S. 2024 election, including stakes, rumors (such as the false stories about Haitian immigrants eating pets in Springfield, Ohio and bogus Venezuelan drug gangs in Aurora, Colorado), and forecasts; convince white Americans that they are on the path of white-ruled Southern Rhodesia, which became black majority-ruled Zimbabwe); promoting false stories about Russian opposition members overseas; and de-legitimize the U.S. 2024 election by inflating Trump’s standing in opinion polls in anticipation of his ultimate loss in the November 5, 2024 election.

The Russians disseminated propaganda on several Facebook pages masquerading as legitimate news organizations. They bore such names as CNN California, Sacramento Inside, California News, and California BBC. The Russian scheme was also aimed at U.S. and foreign audiences through the use of websites impersonating domestic and foreign-based legitimate organizations, including Der Spiegel, Bild, T-Online, Reuters, The Daily Mail, The Guardian, Fox News, Delfi, The Forward, Neues Deutschland, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Der Tagesspiege, Die Welt, Ukrainska Pravda, ManaBalss, Washington Post, Le Monde, Le Parisien, Le Figaro, Obozrevatel, La Repubblica, Milliyet, Al-Bayan, Gulf News, and Freies Volk, the latter a defunct West German Communist Party newspaper that ceased official publication in 1956.

As part of the FBI’s investigation it was discovered that Russia has maintained an active plan of establishing virtual “sleeper communities” to assist Russian intelligence in targeted operations in other nations. The primary platforms used by the Russians are identified asTelegram, X (Twitter), and Facebook.

The recent arrest by French authorities of Pavel Durov, aboved, the Dubai-based billionaire founder of Telegram, appears to be part of a multinational operation by Western nations to curb Russia’s fifth column operations. There is coordinated pressure on Musk’s X and Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta to curtail Russian fifth column and propaganda activities on social media.

Perhaps the most damning discovery by the FBI is the following goal sought by Russia, according to Russian documents seized as part of the Doppelganger investigation: “It makes sense for Russia to put a maximum effort to ensure that the Republican Party point of view (first and foremost, the opinion of Donald Trump supporters) wins over the U.S. public opinion. This includes provisions on peace in Ukraine in exchange for territories, the need to focus on the problems with the US economy, returning troops home from all over the world, etc.”

The Russian Doppelganger documents identify Russia’s targets in the 2024 election as follows:• The swing states of Nevada, Georgia, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.• Residents of “conservative states,” including Alabama, Kansas, Texas, Wyoming, Louisiana, etc.• US citizens of Hispanic descent• American Jews• Israeli influencers• Republican voters• Donald Trump supporters• Supporters of traditional family values• White Americans, representing the lower-middle and middle class• Community of American gamers, users of Reddit and image boards, such as 4chan (the “backbone” of the right-wing trends in the US segment of the Internet)• Facebook, YouTube, X (Twitter), Telegram channels, Instagram, Yandex-zen, and Reddit• Targeted advertising

Russian campaign influence tactics include:• Focus on “record inflation. Halting of economic growth. Unaffordable prices for food and essential goods.• Risk of job loss for white Americans• Privileges for people of color, perverts, and disabled• Constant lies of the Democratic Party administration about the real situation in the country• Threats of crime coming from people of color and immigrants (including new immigrants from Ukraine)• Overspending on foreign policy and at the expense of interests of white U.S. citizens• Constant lies to voters by Democrats in power• Last but not least – America is suffering a defeat despite Kamala Harris’s efforts. We are being drawn into the war. Our guys will die in Ukraine.”

Perhaps one of the most concerning plans by Russian intelligence is to promote the presence on the Mexican side of the U.S. border of mercenaries of the former Russian firm PMC Wagner. The Russian goal is to use “drug gangs, ‘sicarios’ (murderers) squads, crowds of sometimes furious refugees, and smugglers” to pressure such Mexican border cities as Tijuana, Ciudad Juarez, Tecolapa, etc. to encourage those jurisdictions to contract with Russian private military companies to place personnel on the borders of Arizona and Texas. The Russian plans foresee an “exacerbated confrontation” between Mexico and the United States.

The Russian documents quote an American social media influencer on the Russian payroll:

“America have fish that are silent on the left and the right, Canada sleeps at the top, and Mexico dances below. Thus, the United States does not have threats and does not spend energy on mitigating them. All threats are happening in some esoteric realm of the global West and America-centric civilization. Today, the time has come to show to the United States that it is under a threat. And we can do it.”

“We,” as referenced in the Russian documentation, consists of every Trump supporter in the United States. They constitute America’s fifth column. They must be shamed as the traitors, collaborators with America’s enemies, and quislings that they have allowed themselves to become.

Associated Press via WUSF, Black rights activists are convicted of conspiracy, found not guilty of acting as Russian agents, Staff Report, Sept. 12, 2024.  FourBlack rights activists have been convicted in Florida federal court of conspiring to act as unregistered Russian agents. All of them are or were affiliated with the African People’s Socialist Party and Uhuru Movement, which has locations in St. Petersburg and St. Louis.

Four Black rights activists were convicted Thursday in Florida federal court of conspiring to act as unregistered Russian agents.

Jurors deliberated all day Wednesday and returned the guilty verdicts late Thursday morning, the Tampa Bay Times reported. The conspiracy charges carry up to five years in prison. No sentencing date has been set.

All four of those convicted are or were affiliated with the African People’s Socialist Party and Uhuru Movement, which has locations in St. Petersburg, Florida, and St. Louis.

They include Omali Yeshitela, the 82-year-old chairman of the U.S.-based organization focused on Black empowerment and the effort to obtain reparations for slavery and what it considers the past genocide of Africans. Also convicted were Penny Hess, 78, and Jesse Nevel, 34, two leaders of branches of the group’s white allies. A fourth defendant, Augustus C. Romain Jr., 38, was kicked out of the Uhurus in 2018 and established his own group in Atlanta called The Black Hammer.

Yeshitela, Hess and Nevel had also been charged with the more serious crimes of acting as agents of a foreign government, but jurors found them not guilty of those charges.

Attorneys finished their closing arguments late Tuesday. The trial had been scheduled to last a month but moved quickly, concluding after a week of testimony.

Prosecutors said the defendants knowingly partnered with the Russian government to help the Kremlin sow political discord and interfere in U.S. elections.

Defense attorneys argued that Aleksandr Ionov, who runs an organization known as the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia, concealed from the Uhurus his relationship with Russian intelligence. The attorneys also called the government’s case “dangerous” for the First Amendment and asserted that the government was trying to silence the Uhurus for expressing their views.

Three Russians, two of whom prosecutors say are Russian intelligence agents, are also charged in the case but have not been arrested.

Although there are some echoes of claims that Russia meddled in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, U.S. District Judge William Jung previously has said those issues were not part of this case.

Prosecutors have said the group’s members acted under Russian direction to stage protests in 2016 claiming Black people have been victims of genocide in the U.S. They also alleged that the members took other actions for the following six years that would benefit Russia, including opposition to U.S. policy in the Ukraine war.

The defense attorneys, however, have said that despite their connections to the Russian organization, the actions taken by the African People’s Socialist Party and Uhuru Movement were aligned precisely with what they have advocated for in more than 50 years. Yeshitela founded the organization in 1972 as a Black empowerment group opposed to vestiges of colonialism around the world.

Sept. 9

Meidas Touch Network, Commentary: Trump Amplified TENET Media Personalities to Boost Campaign, J.D. Wolf, Sept. 9, 2024. The group was indicted by the DOJ for being a Russian influence operation.

The DOJ has indicted TENET Media for taking Russian money in order to influence the 2024 election. The DOJ’s indictment states TENET Media hired pro-Trump personalities as part of their operation.

During the Republican primary, the Trump campaign put out a news bulletin highlighting that Tim Pool was withdrawing all support from Florida governor Ron DeSantis due to AI being used in his campaign ad against Trump.

Trump also reposted TENET Media personality Benny Johnson’s Truth Social account at least twice. Once in August 2024, amplifying a pro-Trump video produced by Johnson, right.

Trump amplified another Truth Social post from Johnson in February which showed a long line of supporters entering a Trump rally in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Johnson wrote, “No one draws this energy like Trump.”

This is far from an exhaustive list of Trump’s use of assets funded by this Russian influence operation, but serves as examples of such. Influence is hard to measure sometimes, but we can see Trump was able to use these posts both in his Republican primary and the general.

Sept. 7

Washington Post, Russia’s election influence efforts more sophisticated than recent years, officials say, Ellen Nakashima, Sept. 7, 2024. Moscow is using “authentic U.S. voices” on major social media platforms to “launder” propaganda and divisive narratives aimed at swaying Americans.

Letters From An American, Commentary: September 6 [Russian Interference In U.S. Elections], Heather Cox Richardson, Sept. 7, 2024. One of the things that came to light on Wednesday, in the paperwork the Justice Department unveiled to explain its seizure of 32 internet domains being used by Russian agents in foreign malign influence campaigns, was that the six right-wing U.S. influencers mentioned in the indictments of the Russian operatives are only the tip of the iceberg. Since at least 2022, three Russian companies working with the Kremlin have been trying to change foreign politics in a campaign they called “Doppelganger,” covertly spreading Russian government propaganda.

“[F]irst and foremost,” notes from a meeting with Russian officials about targeting Germany read, “we need to discredit the USA, Great Britain, and NATO.” Through fake social media profiles, their operatives posed as Americans or other non-Russians, seeding public conversations with Russian propaganda. In August 2023 they launched the “Good Old USA Project” to target swing-state residents, online gamers, American Jews, and “US citizens of Hispanic descent” to reelect Donald Trump. “They are afraid of losing the American way of life and the ‘American dream,’” one of the propagandists wrote. “It is these sentiments that should be exploited in the course of an information campaign in/for the United States.” Using targeted ads on Facebook, they could see how their material was landing and use bots and trolls to push their narrative in comment sections.

According to the documents, one of the three companies, Social Design Agency (SDA), monitors and collects information about media organizations and social media influencers. It collected a list of 1,900 “anti-influencers,” whose accounts posted material SDA workers thought operated against Russian interests. About 26% of those accounts were based in the U.S. SDA also identified as pro-Russian influencers more than 2,800 people in 81 countries operating on various social media platforms like X, Facebook, and Telegram. Those influencers included “television and radio hosts, politicians, bloggers, journalists, businessmen, professors, think-tank analysts, veterans, professors, and comedians.” About 21% of those influencers were in the U.S.

Sept. 6

The New Republic, Pro-Trump Media Firm Abruptly Folds After Russia Scheme Exposed, Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling, Sept. 6, 2024. Tenet Media is no more. The conservative media network folded Thursday night, just one day after the Department of Justice unsealed an indictment accusing it of being funded by Russian state-controlled media.

Sept. 5

Semafor Principals, Trump says Elon Musk will lead a government efficiency commission, Noah Eckstein, Sept. 5, 2024. The Republican presidential nominee said that if reelected, he would create a commission to audit federal spending headed by the tech billionaire.

Donald Trump announced Thursday that he would create a government efficiency commission led by Elon Musk if reelected to the White House. In a speech laying out his economic vision in New York Thursday, Trump said the task force would audit US agencies and “eliminate fraud and improper payments,” while slashing unnecessary expenses.

Trump and his aides had been discussing the idea that Musk first pitched to him weeks ago during an interview on X. “I think it would be great to just have a government efficiency commission that takes a look at these things and just ensures that the taxpayer money, the taxpayers hard-earned money is spent in a good way,” Musk told Trump during the interview, offering his help for the commission.

Musk, known for his controversial cost-cutting measures at SpaceX and X, posted Thursday that he looked forward “to serving America if the opportunity arises” without pay or a title.

During his speech Thursday, Trump reiterated his proposals to cut corporate tax rates and make the US “the world capital for crypto and Bitcoin.” Trump’s speech comes as his rival Kamala Harris detailed some of her economic policies this week, including proposing a smaller increase to capital gains tax than US President Joe Biden.

New York Times, U.S. Charges American Commentator Who Works for Russian State TV, Julian E. Barnes and Steven Lee Myers, Sept. 5, 2024. Dimitri K. Simes, who was an adviser to Donald J. Trump’s first campaign, and his wife, Anastasia Simes, are accused of violating U.S. sanctions.

The Justice Department indicted an American commentator for Russian television on Thursday as part of a broader effort by the government to crack down on Russia’s attempts to influence American politics ahead of November’s presidential election.

Dimitri K. Simes, who was an adviser to Donald J. Trump’s first presidential campaign, and his wife, Anastasia Simes, were charged with violating economic sanctions against Russia for their work for Channel One, a state-owned television network.

The indictments come as the United States has been cracking down on Russian efforts to spread content from Russian broadcasters among American audiences, often by disguising its origins. Mr. Simes, who owns a home with his wife in Virginia but currently lives in Russia, has hosted a political talk show since 2022 on the network four nights a week on the network and another on Sundays.

Mr. Simes was an influential person in Washington for years, hosting frequent lunches at his think tank blocks from the White House. He would gather government officials, academics and journalists during the uneasy post-Cold War era. The topics often turned to issues of Russia’s relationship with the United States and NATO and Vladimir V. Putin’s ambitions to rebuild Russia.

His indictment comes a day after two employees of another Russian state broadcaster, RT, were indicted on a charge of spending nearly $10 million to have pro-Russia messages spread from a Tennessee company that created and publicized commentary from right-wing, pro-Trump influencers.

The Biden administration has been making a broad push against what it says is a concerted effort by Russia to influence the fall vote. American intelligence officials have said Russia’s president, Mr. Putin, considers November’s election critical because of Democratic support for Ukraine, which Russian troops invaded more than two years ago.

Documents released by the Justice Department show that as part of the effort, Mr. Putin’s office devised a plan to target swing state voters in favor of Mr. Trump and against further support for Ukraine.

Steady, Commentary: Feds Say Russia is Meddling Again, Dan Rather, right, and Team Steady, Sept. 5, 2024. Today Vice President Kamala Harris received the backing of Vladimir Putin. Or at least he gave her a compliment, sort of. Yup, you read that right. At a televised event, Putin said with a hard smirk, Harris has “such an infectious laugh, that it says she’s doing well.” The timing of his “endorsement” is interesting, and certainly no coincidence, coming just hours after the U.S. accused Russia of an extensive effort to help Donald Trump win the 2024 election.

Putin has invested heavily in his admirer and pal Trump. One can assume he would like a return on his money. Just how heavily he’s invested became evident when the U.S. Department of Justice yesterday announced the seizure of 32 websites that are allegedly part of a fake news ring run by the Kremlin to tilt the election for Trump; and the indictment of two employees of RT, the Russian state-run news outlet, for covertly funding an American media company that published thousands of pro-Russia and pro-Trump videos on social media. The fake website ring was part of a Russian government-directed “foreign malign influence” campaign known as Doppelgänger. The made-up domain names were meant to confuse visitors into thinking they were on real news sites like The Washington Post. Instead they were filled with pro-Trump, pro-MAGA propaganda meant to sway American voters as well as squelch support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.

RT funneled nearly $10 million to Tenet Media, a Tennessee-based company that creates far-right video content for social media. Since launching in 2022, Tenet Media has posted more than 2,000 videos, garnering 16 million views on YouTube alone. Benny Johnson, Dave Rubin, and Tim Pool are some of this Russian-financed company’s most popular influencers and regularly post pro-Trump content. Today all three issued statements claiming to be victims of the Russian scheme and that they have always maintained editorial control of their content. It happened in 2016 and then in 2020. Here we are again in 2024 with a spate of new allegations announced by Attorney General Merrick Garland. The Russians, and before them the Soviets, have been trying to influence U.S. elections for decades. It didn’t come to much until Donald Trump, during the 2016 campaign, accepted their offer of “help,” according to the Mueller report. Lest we forget, the official title of that document is the “Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election.”

U.S. District Court Judges Maryellen Noreika (left) of Delaware and Mark Scarsi of California are shown side by side. Both are Trump nominees making key pre-trial rulings rejecting potential defenses by Hunter Biden in separate federal cases making it difficult for him to construct a viable defense in either trial in  prosecutions brought by Trump-appointed federal prosecutors and continued under the Biden Administration. Judge Scarsi, for example, ruled that Biden could not argue that he had paid is delinquent taxes and late penalties.

New York Times, Hunter Biden Pleads Guilty in Tax Case, Glenn Thrush and Lauren Herstik, Sept. 5, 2024. The guilty plea now exposes President Biden’s son to an outcome that once seemed unthinkable: significant time behind bars.

Hunter Biden pleaded guilty on Thursday to nine federal tax charges in Los Angeles, after telling his legal team that he refused to subject his family to another round of anguish and humiliation after a gut-wrenching gun trial in Delaware two months ago.

The dramatic development signaled the final stages of a fraught five-plus year investigation into the period when Mr. Biden was bankrolling his uncontrollable drug and alcohol addiction by leveraging his famous last name into lucrative overseas consulting contracts — while not paying his taxes.

The guilty plea was a unilateral decision by defense lawyers who were persuaded they could not prevail in the trial. It was not part of a plea deal in exchange for reduced punishment.

Mr. Biden, speaking in a low and clipped voice as he sat at the defense table, repeated the word “guilty” nine times as Judge Mark C. Scarsi ticked off each charge.

He will remain free on bond until his sentencing hearing in mid-December.

The guilty plea now exposes President Biden’s son to an outcome that seemed unthinkable last year, when his lawyers were on the cusp of a no-prison plea agreement: significant time behind bars. He now faces a maximum prison sentence of up to 17 years or a fine of up to $1.3 million, on top of the possible sentence of 25 years after being convicted of lying on a firearms application in Delaware in June.

It does not appear, at least for now, that he is banking on executive parental reprieve. As Hunter Biden’s team appeared in court, listening intently while every word of his 56-page criminal indictment was read back to him, the White House press secretary told reporters, “It’s still very much a no,” when asked if the president planned to pardon his son.

The guilty plea came a few hours after Mr. Biden, 54, made a more conditional offer — a so-called Alford plea — in which he acknowledged there was enough evidence to convict him even as he professed innocence toward the same charges. But that did not work.

His team changed course after prosecutors said they would oppose any plea in which Mr. Biden did not accept unconditional guilt, and Judge Scarsi suggested he was inclined to move forward with the case.

“Enough is enough,” Abbe Lowell, one of Mr. Biden’s lawyers, said by midafternoon.

Mr. Lowell said Mr. Biden had decided to plead guilty “so he and his family don’t have to spend one more day focusing on something that happened when he was a man addicted to drugs,” adding: “It’s time to move on.”

Mr. Biden believes that David C. Weiss, the special counsel in the case, had refused to engage in serious plea negotiations after being sharply criticized for signing a generous agreement with Mr. Biden on gun and tax charges that would have resulted in no prison time.

That agreement imploded during a chaotic hearing at the federal courthouse in Wilmington in July 2023, and Mr. Weiss subsequently indicted Mr. Biden on charges of lying on a firearms application in Delaware and on a range of tax violations in California, where he now lives.

The atmosphere in the courtroom in sunny Los Angeles was tense, clamorous and chaotic.

Leo J. Wise, the hard-driving Weiss deputy overseeing the government’s case, said he was stunned when the Biden team interrupted the first day of jury selection with an offer to end the trial on their terms. And he took offense when Mr. Lowell suggested that the government had subjected his client to an unfair prosecution influenced by external political pressures.

“This idea that he’s a victim of this process, it’s offensive,” Mr. Wise said. “We have not exacted a pound of flesh or a drop of blood. We have afforded him the same right as any American.”

Yet much of the courtroom drama had already been drained of its national significance. Mr. Biden’s trial on tax charges went from a central election-year saga to a political afterthought the moment President Biden withdrew from the 2024 race in July.

Paradoxically, the personal stakes have never been higher for his son — a first-time offender who will likely make the case for the lightest permissible sentence, probation instead of prison time, after pleading guilty to evading a tax assessment, failing to file and pay taxes, and filing a false or fraudulent tax return.

In doing so, Mr. Biden’s legal team will argue that he has been clean and sober for years, paid all of his back taxes and penalties and has expressed contrition to his family and associates for his drug-fueled behavior.

People close to Mr. Biden say he has been desperately seeking a way out of the tax trial for weeks in hopes of avoiding a reprise of the weeklong gun case, which included testimony from his ex-romantic partners, including the widow of his brother Beau.

Mr. Wise had signaled his intention to call many of the same witnesses in Los Angeles in court filings — and Mr. Biden was particularly concerned about the possibility that his daughters Naomi and Maisy would be called to testify, they added.

Politico, Hunter Biden faces his next trial with a kneecapped defense strategy, Betsy Woodruff Swan, Sept. 5, 2024 (print ed.). In a series of pretrial rulings, the judge blocked some of Biden’s defense arguments, including that he eventually paid his overdue taxes.

A six-year federal investigation into Hunter Biden will culminate this week as the president’s son faces trial for a second time.

He was convicted this summer on gun charges. Now he faces allegations of criminal tax evasion — and a judge has excluded one of his key lines of defense.

During the trial in Los Angeles — where jury selection is scheduled to start on Thursday — prosecutors plan to tell a story about greed, decadence and entitlement. Biden’s lawyers, meanwhile, will argue it’s actually a tale of addiction and redemption.

In the tax case, Biden’s main lines of defense have been twofold: first, that he was debilitated by his addiction when he allegedly committed the tax crimes, and second, that after he got sober, he paid off his tax debt with penalties and interest.

Biden’s lawyers said in court filings that they wanted to cite the belated payment of his tax debt to undermine prosecutors’ argument that he willfully failed to pay. But Scarsi wasn’t convinced, and on Aug. 27 granted prosecutors’ motion to bar Biden from citing the payment.

“In tax cases, courts routinely exclude evidence that a defendant untimely filed tax returns or untimely paid outstanding tax debts,” he wrote.

That ruling wasn’t the Biden team’s first difficult episode with the judge, a Trump appointee and former patent lawyer. Earlier in the summer, they tried to have the case thrown out, citing Judge Aileen Cannon’s ruling in the Florida-based prosecution of Trump by special counsel Jack Smith. Cannon ruled that Smith’s appointment as a special counsel was unconstitutional, and Biden’s legal team, helmed by Mark Geragos and Abbe Lowell, made a similar argument. In doing so, they wrote that Weiss waited until he became a special counsel to bring criminal charges against Biden.

But, without prompting from prosecutors, Scarsi threatened to sanction Biden’s lawyers for making false statements. They noted that Biden had faced criminal charges before Weiss was made special counsel — namely, in court documents filed in Delaware as part of the failed 2023 plea deal.

“This Court has little tolerance for lack of candor from counsel,” Scarsi wrote in a document ordering Biden’s lawyers to show why they shouldn’t be punished for lying.

In their response, Biden’s lawyers said that they “never tried to mislead the Court,” that their wording was inartful and that they should have said Weiss waited until he was made special counsel to bring “indictments,” rather than “charges.”

Scarsi replied that he doubted “the veracity of that explanation,” because changing the word “charges” to “indictments” wouldn’t have made sense. But, acknowledging that Geragos was new to the Biden case, he said he wouldn’t order sanctions.

Sept. 4

New York Times, U.S. Accuses Russia of Using State Media to Influence 2024 Election, Julian E. Barnes, Glenn Thrush and Steven Lee Myers, Sept. 4, 2024.  American spy agencies have assessed that the Kremlin favors former President Trump, seeing him as skeptical of U.S. support for Ukraine.

The United States plans to unveil indictments on Wednesday that accuse Russia of trying to influence the election in November by using its state-run media to push divisive messages and misinformation, according to U.S. officials.

The indictments are part of a larger federal effort to push back on the Kremlin’s effort to influence the vote. The Treasury Department is set to announce a set of sanctions on Wednesday, and the State Department is set to announce new actions against Russiansinvolved in election influence efforts.

U.S. officials have been stepping up their warnings about Russian election influence efforts. American spy agencies have assessed that the Kremlin favors former President Donald J. Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris in the November contest, seeing him as more skeptical of U.S. support for Ukraine.

The Justice Department and the F.B.I. have been investigating a handful of Americans accused of knowingly spreading false Kremlin narratives. But officials have emphasized they are not aiming to curb free speech. Americans who merely repeat or spread stories they see on Russian state media are not being investigated as part of the efforts, officials said.

The United States has said that Russian intelligence agencies have been using RT, the state-owned broadcaster, to spread disinformation through bots and other efforts. U.S. officials have been looking more closely at how the Kremlin and its spy agencies use RT to influence the election.

Attorney General Merrick B. Garland is holding a meeting of the Justice Department’s Election Threats Task Force on Wednesday and is expected to announce the indictments and detail the government’s latest efforts to halt Russian interference. Other officials, including Christopher A. Wray, the F.B.I. director, and Matthew G. Olsen, the head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, will be in attendance.

The United States was caught flat-footed in 2016 as its spy agencies learned about Russian efforts to influence the vote on behalf of Mr. Trump and were late in warning the public. In subsequent elections, U.S. intelligence officials were more aggressive at quickly calling out Russian, Chinese and Iranian efforts to influence American elections.

But officials say that fighting election interference has been more difficult this year. Some Americans, particularly Mr. Trump’s supporters, see accusations that Russia is spreading disinformation as efforts to undermine their views and policy positions.

The United States has taken some action against Russian organizations it believes are trying to influence American politics. In March, the Treasury Department sanctioned a Russian group that has aided efforts to create fake news sites that spread misinformation.

Much of that misinformation campaign was aimed at derailing military funding for Ukraine as Congress wrestled with a contentious vote this year.

The war in Ukraine has made the U.S. election one of the most pivotal for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. While Ms. Harris is expected to continue the Biden administration’s vigorous support for Ukraine, Mr. Trump has pledged to end the war quickly, forcing the parties into negotiations. His vice-presidential nominee, JD Vance, has spoken disparagingly about providing funding for Ukraine.

Emptywheel, Analysis: Don Jr’s Online Buddies Allegedly Demand $5 Million from Russian Shell Companies to Say Nice Things about His Daddy, Emptywheel (Marcy Wheeler), Sept. 4, 2024. When DOJ announced today it would unseal legal actions against Russian influence operations, the former President’s fail son complained, “Here we go again. LOL.”

Some hours later, it became clear that a number of right-wing influencers, including Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, and Benny Johnson, were unwittingly on the take from Russia, via Tenet Media, which DOJ alleges in a new indictment is a front company for RT.

I consider myself a connoisseur of a well-written indictments. And this, released days after Labor Day and implicating a number of Americans, may be one of my favorites.

Start with the two crimes alleged, like the innermost layer in a matryoshka doll. The indictment only charges two things.

First, conspiracy to violate FARA (18 USC 371), based on just only charges four overt acts, all pertaining to RT persona Elena Afanasyeva:

• Konstantyn Kalashnikov’s addition of Afanasyeva to Tenet’s Discord Server in August 2023.

• Afanasyeva’s circulation fo 841 video clips that got posted onto Tenet’s social media channels, possibly including the video of Tucker Carlson getting off after shopping in a Moscow grocery store.

• Tenet’s June 2024 authorization for Afanasyeva and Kalashnikov to post on Tenet’s platform.

• 30 wire transfers to Tenet, though countries including Türkiye, the Emirates, Mauritius, Czechia, and Hungary, all ultimately going through a bank in NYC.

The second charge, conspiracy to commit money laundering, describes only that Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva used a variety of means to hide that RT was paying for all this.

To prove the FARA charge — one you’d only need to prove if Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva showed up in the US for arrest — you’d need to prove that the two RT people succeeded in influencing US politics, and deliberately hid that they were doing so on behalf of a Russian entity. And RT is sufficient — you wouldn’t need to show that RT was paid by the Russian government.

So you have to show how they worked through cut-outs, the two people who run Tenet media and through them the influencers like Tim Pool and Benny Johnson who got duped.

State Affairs, Feds allege Russians funneled $10M through conservative outlet in Tennessee, Erik Schelzig and Andy Sher, Sept. 4, 2024. Two Russia Today employees are charged with directing money to an unnamed company in Tennessee; The company’s self-described mission quoted in the indictment matches wording on Tenet Media’s website; The indictment alleges the defendants and the company’s founders deceived commentators to obscure the source of the money.

After being dropped by distributors in 2022, the television network formerly known as Russia Today covertly funded a conservative content creation company in Tennessee to spread misinformation, according to a federal indictment unsealed Wednesday.

RT employees Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva were charged with conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act and to commit money laundering.

Afanasyeva allegedly used multiple false personalities to post hundreds of videos on the platforms controlled by an entity identified in the indictment as Company 1, which described itself as a “network of heterodox commentators that focus on Western political and cultural issues.” The description matches language on the website of Tenet Media, which is based in the Green Hills neighborhood of Nashville.

Associated Press via Politico, Trial begins in Florida for activists accused of helping Russia sow division, chaos, Staff Report, Sept. 4, 2024. All four are or were affiliated with the African People’s Socialist Party and Uhuru Movement. At issue is whether the defendants were doing the bidding of the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin or merely ideologically aligned with it.

Trial began Tuesday in Florida for four activists accused of illegally acting as Russian agents to help the Kremlin sow political discord and interfere in U.S. elections.

All four are or were affiliated with the African People’s Socialist Party and Uhuru Movement, which has locations in St. Petersburg, Florida, and St. Louis. Among those charged is Omali Yeshitela, the 82-year-old chairman of the U.S.-based organization focused on Black empowerment and the effort to obtain reparations for slavery and what it considers the past genocide of Africans.

In an opening statement, Yeshitela attorney Ade Griffin said the group shared many goals of a Russian organization called the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia but was not acting under control of that nation’s government under President Vladimir Putin.

“Ladies and gentlemen, that simply is not true,” Griffin told a racially mixed jury. “This is a case about censorship.”

Yeshitela and two others face charges of conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and failing to register with the Justice Department as agents of a foreign government. The fourth defendant, who later founded a separate group in Atlanta called Black Hammer, faces only the conspiracy charge. They have all pleaded not guilty.

Three Russians, two of whom prosecutors say are Russian intelligence agents, are also charged in the case but have not been arrested.

Although there are some echoes of claims that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election, U.S. District Judge William Jung said those issues are not part of this case.

“This trial will not address Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election,” Jung said in an order dated Monday.

In his opening statement, Justice Department attorney Menno Goedman said the group’s members acted under Russian direction to stage protests in 2016 claiming Black people have been victims of genocide in the U.S. and took other actions for the following six years that would benefit Russia, including opposition to U.S. policy in the Ukraine war.

“This is about dividing Americans, dividing communities, turning neighbor against neighbor,” Goedman told jurors. “The defendants acted at the direction of the Russian government to sow division right here in the U.S.”

That included support for a St. Petersburg City Council candidate in 2019 that the Russians claimed to “supervise,” according to the criminal indictment. The candidate lost that race and has not been charged in the case.

Much of the alleged cooperation involved support for Russian’s invasion of Ukraine. In March 2022, Yeshitela held a news conference in which he said the “African People’s Socialist Party calls for unity with Russia in its defensive war in Ukraine against the world colonial powers.” He also called for the independence of the Russian-occupied Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine.

The defense attorneys, however, said despite their connections to the Russian organization, the actions taken by the African People’s Socialist Party and Uhuru Movement were aligned precisely with what they have advocated for more than 50 years. Yeshitela founded the organization in 1972 as a Black empowerment group opposed to vestiges of colonialism around the world.

“They shared some common beliefs,” said attorney Leonard Goodman, who represents defendant Penny Hess. “That makes them threatening.”

August

Aug. 31

SpyTalk, Putin: ‘A Very Savvy Gangster’ Who Won’t Stop at Ukraine, Says Former US Envoy to Russia John Sullivan, Michael Isikoff, right, Aug. 31, 2024. Biden timid, adds the former ambassador, who also chides fellow Republicans for not backing Ukraine.

During the height of the Vietnam War, the top American general William Westmoreland famously reassured policymakers in Washington that there was “light at the end of the tunnel.” But today, when it comes to another seemingly endless war, this one in Ukraine, John Sullivan, who served both Presidents Trump and Biden as ambassador to Russia, sees no flicker of light at all—only pitch black darkness. “ This is gonna be a bloody sore on the face of Europe for a long time to come,” said Sullivan in an interview for the SpyTalk podcast when asked to assess the state of the conflict.

Sullivan, left, is the author of a fascinating new book, Midnight in Moscow, that recounts his experiences overseeing the U.S. Embassy in Russia — “behind enemy lines,” as he puts it — while Vladimir Putin launched a naked war of aggression aimed at toppling the Kyiv government of Volodymyr Zelensky and turning Ukraine into a Russian vassal state. It was a nail-biting experience, during which Sullivan was regularly piped into secure National Security Council conference calls as the Biden White House mobilized western support to punish Moscow with economic sanctions while rushing billions of dollars worth of military hardware to Ukraine to repel the Russian invaders.

But more than two and half years after Russia’s invasion, the war has turned into a gruesome and protracted conflict with no clear path to victory for either side. In his book, Sullivan depressingly concludes that the Ukraine war could drag on for “decades” or, as in the case of Korea, never really end at all. To be sure, the recent Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk region — during which Kyiv’s forces broke through thinly manned defenses and captured dozens of towns and villages — has bolstered the country’s morale and given Zelensky’s government new hope. Sullivan calls it “the biggest change on the battlefield” since 2022 and a huge “embarrassment” for Vladimir Putin. But, he also concedes, it will also likely only harden Russian resolve to win back its territory, even as the country’s military plows ahead in Ukraine itself, with punishing drone attacks on civilian infrastructure

In short, the world may be looking at a stalemate — prolonged, costly and increasingly bloody with no indication either side is prepared to back down. If that is the case, doesn’t that strengthen the argument for a diplomatic “off-ramp,” a territorial compromise that ultimately recognizes the harsh reality on the ground that there may be no strategic path for the Ukrainians to expel the Russians from Donbas and Crimea?

Sullivan demurs. While he concedes that “it’s difficult to imagine at this point the Ukrainians pushing the Russians out,” he quickly adds: “When I hear my fellow Republicans, particularly members of Congress who say things like, ‘why are we defending Ukraine’s borders? I don’t care what happens to Ukraine,’ they’re focusing on the wrong thing. The most important thing for the United States is to oppose Russian aggression.”

Aug. 28

RFK Jr. at home in California.

New York Times, Trump to Put Kennedy and Gabbard on His Transition Team, Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swan and Rebecca Davis O’Brien, Aug. 28, 2024 (print ed). Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Gabbard, who had been progressive Democrats for many years, will join the former president’s sons and Senator JD Vance, his running mate, as honorary co-chairs.

Donald J. Trump plans to name his former rival, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Tulsi Gabbard, a one-time Democrat, as honorary co-chairs of a presidential transition team that will help him select the policies and personnel of any second Trump administration, according to a campaign senior adviser.

Mr. Kennedy, who ended his independent campaign for president and endorsed Mr. Trump on Friday, described his transition role briefly in an interview that aired Monday.

“I’ve been asked to go on the transition team, you know, and to help pick the people who will be running the government,” Mr. Kennedy told Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host, in an interview posted on X.

Both Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Gabbard spent most of their public life as progressive Democrats. Only four months ago, Mr. Trump was calling Mr. Kennedy a “Radical Left Lunatic” who was “far more LIBERAL than anyone running as a Democrat.” Trump allies pushed stories about Mr. Kennedy’s record of supporting abortion rights and far-left environmentalism as they tried to make his independent candidacy less appealing to Trump voters.

Ms. Gabbard, right, a former congresswoman who left the Democratic Party after her 2020 presidential run and who endorsed Mr. Trump on Monday, has been helping with the informal debate preparation sessions Mr. Trump has held in recent weeks.

It’s unclear what exactly she and Mr. Kennedy will do in their transition roles, but they will join Mr. Trump’s sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, as well as his running mate, Senator JD Vance, as honorary chairs of the transition.

Brian Hughes, a Trump campaign senior adviser, said that they are “proud that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard have been added to the Trump/Vance Transition team. We look forward to having their powerful voices on the team as we work to restore America’s greatness.”

April

April 4

A Wayne Madsen Report chart showing links between Russians and prominent Republican officials.

Wayne Madsen Report, Special Report: The Russian Bear in the West’s Political HousesSpecial Report: The Russian Bear in the West’s Political Houses, Wayne Madsen Report, April 4, 2024. Russian agents and assets permeate Western political systems. Democracy cannot survive with Kremlin stooges acting as modern-day quislings. (WMR Special Report of 27 pages available with WMR monthly subscription.)

In legislatures around the world intelligence agents, assets, and dupes are feverishly working to undermine democratic governance and sowing political chaos. This Kremlin- directed subterfuge is designed to advance the cause of fascism, thrust fascist-oriented political parties into power, and undermine the very fabric of modern liberal democracy.

Ever since Russia was documented to have co-opted social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter and data miners like Cambridge Analytica to influence the 2016 Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom and the 2016 presidential election in the United States, Moscow has doubled down on its political influence operations by outright enlisting far-right and some far-left Western politicians to do its bidding.

While vehemently denying that Russia interferes in Western elections and popular referendums, Putin has no problem blaming the West for interfering in Russian elections, including his 2024 lopsided 87 percent victory in a quite fraudulent “re- election.”Moscow’s plan is simple.

By subjecting Western and other democracies to unending political chaos, Russia and its allies, most notably China and Iran, are able to extend their political, economic, and military influence far beyond their borders. In this article, we expose Russia’s tentacles that reach into practically every national and sub- national legislature in the world and shine a spotlight on the politicians who have sold out their nations to benefit Russia.

Source: https://www.justice-integrity.org/2091-donald-trumps-putin-plan-to-destroy-american-democracy