The arrival of Donald Trump on the political scene was a real gift for the Russian president.
The latter never missed an opportunity to sow discord among the American competitor, but I do not think I am wrong in saying that the past eight years have produced profits that exceed investments.
After interfering in the 2016 and 2020 elections, Russian hackers will do so again in 2024, and can now count on Republican elected officials to spread disinformation.
Hackers are getting better
Russian hackers were particularly effective in promoting the candidacy of Bernie Sanders in 2016, much to Hillary Clinton's dismay, and they subsequently benefited from Donald Trump's complicity (direct or indirect).
The latter had explicitly requested it during a speech before he preferred Vladimir Putin’s words to the information obtained by the American intelligence services.
These hackers actually operate not exclusively in the United States. In their attempt to influence the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine, they are also targeting Germany, France and Poland.
What is even more alarming is that they are now using artificial intelligence to multiply excessive counterfeiting (Deep fakes), stealing confidential data and transmitting its disinformation on multiple platforms through fake accounts such as “People Say” which can still be referenced on X (former Twitter).
Sell your soul to Putin
For some time now, I've been thinking about Ronald Reagan. The man who Republicans once considered one of their party's greatest presidents would be turning in his grave if he read the statements of a growing number of GOP elected officials.
It's not even the Democrats who are recently condemning the lies being peddled within the Republican Party, but rather the influential members of the Republican Party who are doing so! Michael McCaul, who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, spoke yesterday about a real conspiracy virus.
And those who suffer from it are repeating Russian disinformation verbatim in collusion with some media outlets like Fox News or its former host Tucker Carlson. Former presidential candidate and Utah Senator Mitt Romney used the harshest words when he referred to behavior that amounted to treason.
Perhaps even more troubling than what I just mentioned is that many Republican elected officials are acting not only out of opportunism, but because they feel a sincere affinity for what Vladimir Putin is proposing.
We seem to see him as an ally, or a leader who embodies a version of conservatism that proposes an authoritarian style while exacerbating nationalism as manifest as that espoused by Viktor Orbán and Donald Trump.
What these “new collaborators” do not seem to understand is that Putin only wants to weaken the United States, that the relationship is one-sided and that they are merely puppets of a manipulator with great talent.
