Propaganda Watch: Russian Social Media Ads–4/21/19

Russian President Vladimir Putin superimposed into a Russian Flag. Image by Lenny Ghoul.

This is part of an ongoing series where I review some of the ads purchased by the Russians. In doing so I hope we can get a better understanding of what they were trying to do, and how to recognize it the next time we’re faced with propaganda.

If you want to follow along, the ads can all be downloaded here.

First things first, I have to post a retraction. I had previously mentioned that Kamala Harris was the first national contender mentioned in the Russian ads. I was mistaken. It appears Pete Buttigieg had her beat by two days (file 2015-q2/2015-06/p(1)0002576):

The rest of the posts will be from the 2015-q4/2015-10 folder.

This past week brought us the release of the Mueller report. In it they discuss these ads and how, in 2016, the anti-Clinton sentiment ramped up. The first anti-Hilary ad came in October of 2015 (p(1)0002410):

Clinton was not the only Democratic politician attacked in this folder. Obama and his “voters” were attacked in file p(1)0000102:

That’s it for now. I hope you all have a wonderful Easter, happy Passover, or just a generally lovely Sunday, and please enjoy this Open Thread.

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