US adversaries step up efforts to influence upcoming election results

Russia, Iran and China are stepping up their efforts to influence the outcome of presidential elections and lower-level presidential races in the United States, targeting American voters with an ever-expanding array of sophisticated influence operations.

The latest assessment from US intelligence agencies, shared on Friday, warns that Russia remains the preeminent threat, with Russian influence campaigns seeking to boost the chances of Republican presidential nominee and former US President Donald Trump over Democratic vice-presidential nominee Kamala Harris.

Russian actors, led by networks created by the Kremlin-backed media outlet RT, “are supporting Moscow’s efforts to influence voter preferences in favor of the former president and diminish the vice president’s prospects,” a senior intelligence official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information.

“RT has built and used networks of American and other Western personalities to create and spread pro-Russian narratives while attempting to mask the content as genuine American free speech,” the official said.

And RT, the official added, is just part of a growing Kremlin-led campaign seeking to impact not just the race for the White House but also smaller elections across the United States, with an added emphasis on key swing states.

“Russia’s influence apparatus is very large and it’s worth noting that they have other entities that are active,” the official said. “Russia is working on the election from the top down, as well as spreading divisive themes.”

Tracking Russian influence efforts has become more difficult, and U.S. officials say there is a greater degree of sophistication and a greater emphasis on amplifying American voices with pro-Russian viewpoints rather than seeding social media with Kremlin-crafted narratives.

“It’s not just Russian bots and trolls and fake personas on social media, although that’s part of it,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby told VOA on Friday.

“We are not taking anything for granted,” he added. “There is no doubt that [el presidente ruso Vladimir] Putin has every intention of trying to sow discord here in the United States, of trying to pump Russian disinformation and propaganda to the American people, through what he believes to be our credible sources, whether online or on television, and we have to take that seriously.”

Intelligence officials have declined to share additional details about Russia’s network of influence operations. But Wednesday’s indictments by the U.S. Justice Department have shed some light on the scope of the Kremlin’s recent operations.

In one case, the US accused two RT employees of using fake personas and shell companies to funnel nearly $10 million to Tenet Media, a Tennessee-based company that produces videos and podcasts for a group of conservative political influencers.

The goal, prosecutors said, was to produce and distribute content that promoted what Moscow considered pro-Russian policies.

In a separate action, the United States seized 32 Internet domains linked to an operation run by a key Putin aide. The goal, U.S. officials said, was to mimic legitimate U.S. news sites to spread propaganda created in Russia.

RT publicly ridiculed the allegations, while some of the influencers who work with Tenet posted statements on social media platform X saying they were unaware of the company’s ties to Moscow.

As for the latest U.S. intelligence allegations, the Russian Embassy in Washington has not yet responded to VOA’s request for comment, though it has described the earlier allegations as “Russophobic.”

Requests for comment from the Trump and Harris campaigns have also so far gone unanswered.

But previous US intelligence claims about Russian support for Trump have drawn the ire of the Trump campaign, which has pointed to public statements by Russia’s Putin supporting Trump’s opponents.

“When President Trump was in the Oval Office, Russia and all of America’s adversaries were deterred because they feared how the United States would respond,” Trump campaign national press secretary Karoline Leavitt told VOA in an email last July.

But U.S. intelligence officials said it would be a mistake to rely on Putin’s words, including his public comments Thursday expressing support for Harris.

The U.S. intelligence community “does not take Putin’s public statements as representative of Russia’s covert intentions,” the senior official said. “There are many examples in recent years where Putin’s public statements do not align with Russian actions. For example, his comments that he would not invade Ukraine.”

Experts say Iran and China are trying to influence the results

U.S. intelligence agencies stressed Friday that Russia is not alone in its effort to shape the outcome of the November U.S. election, warning that both Tehran and Beijing are stepping up their influence campaigns just 60 days before American voters go to the polls.

“Iran is making a greater effort than in the past to influence this year’s election, although its tactics and approaches are similar to those in previous cycles,” the intelligence official said, describing a “multi-pronged approach to stoke internal divisions and undermine voter confidence in the American democratic system.”

U.S. intelligence agencies had previously assessed that Iran had focused some of its efforts on denigrating Trump’s campaign, believing his election would likely worsen tensions between Tehran and Washington.

Last month, U.S. officials also blamed Iran for a hacking and leaking operation targeting the Trump campaign, though they said Iranian-linked actors have also tried to infiltrate Harris’s campaign.

As for China, U.S. intelligence officials said it appears Beijing is still content to stay out of the U.S. presidential race, seeing little difference between Trump and Harris.

But there are signs that China is accelerating its efforts to influence other political contests.

U.S. intelligence “is aware of attempts by the People’s Republic of China to influence U.S. elections in the runoff elections by targeting candidates it considers particularly threatening to the People’s Republic of China’s core security interests,” the official said.

“Online influencers from the People’s Republic of China have also continued small-scale efforts on social media to engage American audiences on divisive political issues, including protests over the Israel-Gaza conflict, and promote negative narratives about both political parties,” the official added.

‘Malicious speculation against China’

The Chinese Embassy in Washington on Friday rejected the US intelligence assessment.

“China has no intention to interfere in the US election and will not do so, and we hope that the US side will not make China an issue in the election,” spokesman Liu Pengyu told VOA in an email.

Liu added that accusations that Beijing is using social media to influence American public opinion “are full of malicious speculation against China, which China firmly opposes.”

While U.S. intelligence officials have identified Russia, Iran and China as the main purveyors of disinformation, they are not alone.

Officials have said countries like Cuba are also engaging in influence operations, albeit on a much smaller scale.

And other countries are getting closer to crossing that line.

“We are seeing a number of countries considering activities that, at a minimum, test the limits of electoral influence,” the U.S. assessment said. “These activities include lobbying political figures to try to gain their favor should they be elected to office.”

[Misha Komadovsky contribuyó a este informe]

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