The U.S. has handed down new sanctions on executives of Russian state media companies and restricted other broadcasters with links to the Kremlin.
On Wednesday, coordinated actions were announced by the treasury, state and justice departments to “aggressively counter” what they called a widespread campaign to interfere with the upcoming presidential election in November.
Merrick Garland, the attorney general, specifically accused RT, a state broadcaster in Russia, of paying a company in Tennessee $10 million to “create and distribute content to U.S. audiences with hidden Russian government messaging.”
Margarita Simonyan, the head of RT, was one of the 10 people who were sanctioned for the alleged attempts to harm “public trust in our institutions.” RT has denied having any involvement in the allegations.
Garland added that Russia was hoping to secure a “preferred outcome” of the presidential election between Democratic nominee Kamala Harris and GOP nominee Donald Trump.
John Kirby, the national security spokesman for the White House, said the Russian program was aimed at “reducing international support for Ukraine, bolstering pro-Russian policies and interests, and influencing voters here in the U.S.”
An official with the Treasury Department, meanwhile, said RT as well as other state media in Russia have engaged in what was called a “nefarious campaign to covertly recruit unwittingly American influencers in support of their malign activity.”
Two RT managers who are based in Moscow — 27-year-old Elena Afanasyeva and 31-year-old Kostiantyn Kalashnikov — have been charged for paying some American content creators to “pump pro-Russian propaganda and disinformation” to audiences here.
The U.S. also sanctioned 10 people and two other entities for “activities that aim to deteriorate public trust in our institutions.”
Employees of the media outlets that are backed by the Kremlin also had their visas restricted.
The U.S. additionally seized 32 internet domain names that were being used to “covertly promote AI-generated false narratives” that were targeting specific regions and demographics in the U.S. on various social media platforms.
The Biden administration is also offering a $10 million reward for any information about hackers who are associated with the Russian Angry Hackers Did It group, also known as RaHDit.
Kirby said that a lot of the disinformation effort being carried about by the Kremlin is being funded and directed by RT. As he said:
“RT is no longer just a propaganda arm of the Kremlin. It’s being used to advance covert Russian influence actions.”
In response, the media outlet mocked the accusations the federal government has levied against it. They issued a statement to the BBC that said:
“2016 called and it wants its cliches back. Three things are certain in life: death, taxes and RT’s interference in the U.S. elections.”
Afanasyeva and Kalashnikov have been criminally indicted, though the content creation company that they used that’s based in Tennessee wasn’t specifically named in that indictment.
What was written in the indictment does match the description of that of an outlet that’s called Tenet Media, according to the BBC.
