by John Hugh Demastri, The Daily Caller:
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warned Twitter that Russia was attempting to take advantage of social media platforms that were “permissive” of “misinformation,” since Russia viewed such sites as “operational advantages,” according to internal Twitter documents published by journalist Matt Taibbi Friday.
The warning was sent via an FBI liaison, who issued a trio of DHS “products” to Twitter on March 3, 2021, two of which concerned the influence of Russia and Iran respectively on upcoming elections, while the third focused on the need for social media companies to ensure they collaborated effectively with the government to combat domestic extremism, according to Taibbi. The liaison sent the products to Twitter legal executive Stacia Cardille following a meeting the week prior, noting they “may be of assistance to Twitter,” and offering to field any questions that Twitter’s team had, Taibbi reported.
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“We assess that Russian malign influencers probably will increasingly use US social media platforms that offer more permissive operating environments,” one DHS “product” reads, according to Taibbi. “We base this assessment on the reduced effectiveness of Russian influence operations on established US social media platforms and current Russian proxy activity on these growing US platforms. Our assessment also is based on the assumption that Russian malign influences see operational advantages in sites with less active effort to ban false information, offensive language, and inauthentic behavior.”
33.The ubiquity of the 2016 Russian interference story as stated pretext for building out the censorship machine can’t be overstated. It’s analogous to how 9/11 inspired the expansion of the security state. pic.twitter.com/GSaEzM0aYo
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) December 16, 2022
During the course of the 2020 elections, however, the U.S. government was not focused on the impact of foreign agents on “non-presidential” races, according to an email from Cardille to Twitter’s then-Deputy General Counsel James Baker, published by Taibbi. Cardille wrote to Baker, updating him on the events of a “Government-Industry Sync” meeting, where Twitter and other social media companies met with the FBI, DHS and other government agencies, on Sept. 16, 2020, less than two months before the 2020 election.
“I asked if the [U.S. government] was tracking foreign threats related to non-presidential races,” Cardille wrote. After a long silence, an unidentified government official informed Twitter that the “government is not tracking foreign interference or threats related to down ballot races.”
