They invented the Russian conspiracy, then they faked the crimes.When the Democrats and the media wanted to prove that Russian trolls were everywhere, and supporting Republicans, they turned to Jonathon Morgan and Renee DiResta.
Morgan and DiResta had originally been part of Obama’s futile effort to fight ISIS on social media, before discovering a much more lucrative field. ISIS was losing on the battlefield and the Democrats were losing elections. The Hillary campaign had hatched a conspiracy theory blaming its loss on Russian trolls. And Morgan and DiResta soon became the experts providing the data linking Republicans to Russian trolls.
Every time there was a story on Russian election interference, Morgan would show up on CNN or NBC. And his message was the same, the Russian bots were everywhere and they were a major threat.
Morgan and DiResta soon had a company name, New Knowledge, and were brought on board by the Senate Intelligence Committee to produce a report on Russian influence operations in the 2016 election. Despite the fact that a second report found that most of the Russian trolling efforts had been directed at African-Americans, the New Knowledge report claimed that this was a Russian conspiracy to aid Trump.
The New York Times, which frequently promoted and published New Knowledge conspiracy theories, all but credited DiResta for having exposed the whole Russian-Republican troll conspiracy, and wrote that, “Senate and House staff members, who knew of DiResta's expertise through her public reports and her previous work advising the Obama administration on disinformation campaigns, had reached out to her and others to help them prepare for the hearings.” They seemingly included Senator Warner’s office.
And it wasn’t just the 2016 election. Morgan, who made no secret of his loathing for conservatives, claimed that the Russian bots were everything and aiding Republicans.
When the #ReleasetheMemo hashtag went viral, Morgan, now running his own company, New Knowledge, was there suggesting it might be Russian bots. The debates about gun control after the Parkland school massacre? More Russian bots. The migrant caravan? Obviously a fake news conspiracy.
"That whole news cycle was dominated by this type of conspiratorial fear-mongering," Morgan sniffed, even though his current career is based around conspiratorial lefty fear-mongering.
And the midterm elections?
"Russians Meddling in the Midterms? Here’s the Data," Morgan and Ryan Fox, a New Knowledge employee, warned. “Our company is currently detecting more overall activity in real time from continuing Russian online influence operations targeting the midterm elections than has been disclosed by social media platforms or detected by researchers during the same period before the election in 2016.”
The Russians were even going all the way into Alabama. “Russian trolls tracked by #Hamilton68 are taking an interest in the AL Senate race. What a surprise,” Morgan tweeted.
It wouldn’t have been much of a surprise to him because the “Russian trolls” supporting Roy Moore in Alabama were actually his trolls.
A New York Times story was forced to reveal that Morgan had participated in what a report described as...
