2 Russia-based RT employees indicted by US, internet domains seized in election influence probe

The Biden administration is accusing Russia on Wednesday of trying to influence the 2024 U.S. presidential election by targeting American voters through state-run media and other online platforms as part of a campaign referred to as "doppelganger."

Attorney General Merrick Garland, speaking alongside FBI Director Christopher Wray and Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, said prosecutors today have unsealed an indictment in the Southern District of New York of "two Russian-based employees of RT, a Russian state-controlled media outlet" that charges them with "conspiring to commit money laundering and to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act."

Garland told reporters that in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the editor-in-chief of the RT TV network "said the company had built 'an entire empire of covert projects designed to shape public opinion in Western audiences.'"

"We allege that as part of that effort, RT and its employees, including the defendants, implemented a nearly $10 million scheme to fund and direct a Tennessee-based company to publish and disseminate content deemed favorable to the Russian government," Garland said. "To implement this scheme, the defendants directed the company to contract with U.S.-based social media influencers to share this content and their platforms. The subject matter and content of many of the videos published by the company were often consistent with Russia's interest in amplifying U.S. domestic divisions in order to weaken U.S. opposition to core Russian interests, particularly its ongoing war in Ukraine.

"In a separate enforcement action, the Justice Department is seizing 32 internet domains that the Russian government and the Russian-sponsored actors have used to engage