The US Department of Justice has charged two Russians it identified as RT employees with money laundering and working as foreign agents for their alleged role in pushing video content that sowed “discord and division” in the US.
In a criminal indictment unsealed on Wednesday, US prosecutors claimed that Konstantin Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva financed and directed a Tennessee-based production company that published English-language videos to various social media platforms aimed at amplifying “domestic divisions in the United States.”
These videos were viewed more than 16 million times on YouTube alone, the indictment alleged, and, according to FBI Director Christopher Wray, represented an attempt to “trick Americans into unwittingly consuming foreign propaganda.”
Producing videos that highlight social and political divisions in the US is not a crime. However, the Justice Department claimed that Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva broke the law by not registering as foreign agents.
Back in 2017, the Department of Justice forced the now-defunct RT America to register as a foreign agent, after a host of US intelligence agencies claimed that RT had helped to elect Donald Trump by publishing “negative coverage” of Hillary Clinton and criticizing the US’ “corrupt political establishment.”
Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva face a maximum sentence of five years in prison for violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act, and 20 years for money laundering. However, the charges against them will likely never be proven in an American courtroom, as the US has no extradition treaty with Russia.
The two Russians were also sanctioned by the US Treasury Department on Wednesday, along with RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan and three other senior RT employees. Simonyan dismissed the charges, responding “great job, team!” on Telegram.
In a press conference on Wednesday, US Attorney General Merrick Garland said that the allegations against Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva, as well as a separate Russian scheme to allegedly spread anti-Ukraine content online, “make clear the ends to which the Russian government, including at its highest levels, is willing to go to undermine our democratic process.”
Simonyan ridiculed US officials for claiming – for the third election in a row – that RT is attempting to interfere in American politics. “If they kick us out completely, how will they conduct the next elections?” she wrote in a follow-up post on Telegram. “They don’t have any other strategies except to scaremonger about the almighty RT.”