Delaney, and others like him, are by all accounts acting in good faith, simply writing articles and opinion pieces they would for any other outlet.
Voices that challenge conventional wisdom are all good things, says Delaney, but not at the behest of a foreign (or any) government. The writer was shocked, appalled, and embarrassed on Tuesday when he came to the realization he had been co-opted by an apparent Russian influence operation.
“I’m obviously no fan of Putin or the Russian government,” he told CNN in an interview on Thursday. “I don’t want to have any association with an authoritarian regime.”
Delaney wasn’t the only one — some other Americans were also unwittingly coopted to write for the website.
In 2016, the same Russian troll group that Facebook said was tied to Peace Data, ran a network of fake sites and social media accounts posing as everything from Black Lives Matter activists to pro-Second Amendment groups. CNN has previously documented how, as part of that effort, unwitting Americans were recruited to organize protests and stage stunts.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation in 2018 identified the persona “Alice Donovan” as being run by the GRU, Russian military intelligence.
The persona was used to plant articles in a real US publication, the independent leftwing magazine CounterPunch.
