(Bloomberg) -- Russia, China and Iran are all recruiting Americans to spread propaganda advancing their interests ahead of the US presidential election, American intelligence officials said Monday.
Some US citizens have been knowingly helping foreign governments “seed, promote and add credibility to narratives that serve the foreign actors’ interests,” the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said in its latest update on election security. Others in the US have been duped into aiding the foreign actors, according to the report.
Although intelligence officials, who briefed reporters largely on condition of anonymity Monday, didn’t invoke the names of US presidential candidates, their comments made clear that they believe Russia is trying to help Republican nominee Donald Trump while Iran is seeking to undermine his candidacy.
Russian operatives, in particular, have undertaken efforts to build and use networks of US and Western “personalities” to create and disseminate Russian-friendly narratives,” according to the report.
“These actors are seeking to back a presidential candidate in addition to influencing congressional electoral outcomes, undermine public confidence in the electoral process and exacerbate sociopolitical division,” the intelligence office said. US intelligence agencies found that Russia sought to bolster Trump in 2016 and 2020.
The accusations are “absurd,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Tuesday, the Interfax news service reported. “We absolutely reject them.”
On Iran, a US official said Iran wanted to influence the election as it did in 2020, after Trump scrapped an international nuclear deal with Tehran and imposed severe sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
“Iran does not engage in any objectives or activities intended to influence the US election,” a representative of Iran’s Mission to the United Nations said in a written statement Monday. “A significant portion of such accusations are characterized by psychological operations designed to artificially pep up election campaigns.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian said at a regular press briefing in Beijing that his nation “has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections of the US.”
“The US side should not spread disinformation to vilify China and should not make China an issue in US elections,” he added.
The attempted assassination of former President Trump as well as President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw his candidacy, have become fodder in influence narratives seeking to undermine the electoral process, according to the officials.
They declined to comment when asked whether anyone associated with US presidential campaigns or any US lawmakers are knowingly helping Russia carry out influence operations.
Marketing, PR
US intelligence agencies also have observed outsourcing by the Kremlin to marketing and public relations firms to shape public opinion in the US, said an official at the Office of the National Director of Intelligence.
Moscow is leveraging Russia-based influence-for-hire firms with skills to complicate tracing efforts back to their source as well as being more nimble and having fewer bureaucratic hurdles than government agencies, according to the US officials. The firms have created influence platforms that discreetly engage Americans and tailor content while masking Russia’s involvement.
Two Russian firms were sanctioned by the US government earlier this year for creating fake websites designed to impersonate government media organizations in Europe. It wasn’t clear whether these firms were among those described by the officials.
Similarly, the Chinese government has collaborated with a China-based technology company to enhance its “covert influence operations, including to more efficiently create content that connects with local audiences,” the official said. They declined to name the company involved.
Although China doesn’t seek to influence the outcome of the presidential election, the US officials said, there’s the possibility that Beijing-related actors may try to denigrate down-ballot candidates seen as threatening China’s core interests. One of the official said this occurred in a handful of midterm races in 2022, involving members of both political parties.
At the same time, influence actors affiliated with China continue to use social media to sow division in the US and portray democracies as chaotic, the official said.
--With assistance from Philip Glamann.
(Updates with Kremlin response in the sixth paragraph)
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