Large covert operations to influence Americans and American lawmakers are a constant in the digital information war tactics of Iran, Russia, and China. A Washington Post article revealed this week that a “top editor at an online news site aimed at Americans who has worked extensively for Russia’s Sputnik also has taken money from Iranian government-owned media, according to newly unearthed documents.”
That news site is called The Grayzone, an online media outlet that reaches millions of digital consumers, and that top editor is Wyatt Reed, according to the Post. The Post quotes Emerson Brooking, co-director of the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Research Lab, who says “you have someone who has deep ties to Iranian state media working for an organization that we also know is a destination for narrative laundering from Russia.”
The site, as an alleged purveyor of Russian and Iranian propaganda and disinformation, has had some high-level American assistance in disseminating its stories to the public — sometimes by members of the U.S. government. Senator Mike Lee (R-UT), for example, is known to have used Grayzone stories as a prompt to question his own government’s activities, evidently goaded into doing this by Putin propagandists and Iranian covert digital operatives working through fringe news blogs.
Yesterday’s Washington Post article exposing “The Gray Zone News” for taking Russian and Iranian money to push disinformation should be of particular interest to US Senator @BasedMikeLee that regularly cites it as an information source. pic.twitter.com/QcBrIDkCXO
— Jay in Kyiv (@JayinKyiv) June 3, 2024
Above is an example of an anti-Ukraine message Lee passed along, which attempts to implicate the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
“Sen. Lee is certainly one of the most influential and impactful elected officials within the Republican Party here in Utah,” current GOP chairman Rob Axson told the Post. Some constituents, as well as Americans outside Utah, want to hear from the Senator on how he chose his sources.
Would be great for America to hear from Senator Lee.
— charles mccullagh (@ChuckMcCullagh) June 3, 2024