‘Nice Work if You Can Get It, Comrade’: US YouTubers Got Big Bucks to Fuel Russian Propaganda
Three right-wing influencers said part of scheme
For the third time in a row, US officials have uncovered evidence of Russian attempts to interfere with US elections.
In this case, two employees of Russian state media are accused of covertly funding a Tennessee-based company with nearly $10 million to publish English-language videos on social media platforms including TikTok and YouTube with messages in favor of the Russian government’s interests and agenda, including about the war in Ukraine.
In particular, three right-wing influencers are said to have been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars each for videos that collectively attracted more than 16 million views on YouTube alone, prosecutors said.
The three are: Benny Johnson, Tim Pool, and Dave Rubin, each with 1.4 million or more subscribers.
Although US law enforcement charged the Russians with crimes, the three American YouTubers have not been charged with any crimes. The three Americans said that they were not aware that they were part of Russian interference.
The Russian propaganda dovetailed with targets these American content creators were already talking about, like attacking diversity equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
“The Russians are just banking on the things right wingers are already hopped up on to scare white voters to vote for the candidate Vladimir Putin wants to win, and no surprise, his preferred candidate is this guy,” said MSNBC host Joy Reid, referring to Donald Trump.
Although they denied knowing about the Russian scheme, some in US media suggested that, perhaps, the three American influencers might have wondered about the large sums that they were being paid at the time.
“But here clearly, you know, this is a very suspicious type of endeavor,” CNN journalist Donie O’Sullivan said during a segment with host Jake Tapper. “And look, Jake, what I will say is that all these guys have said that, you know, they didn’t know that they were working for the Russians, but certainly it was a lot of money.”
“Yeah. It’s kind of unusual to be paid $400,000 to do a few YouTube videos every week,” Tapper replied.
“It would be nice,” O’Sullivan noted.
“Yeah, it’s nice work if you can get it, comrade,” Tapper quipped.
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