At least one of the Facebook ads that were purchased by a Kremlin-linked troll factory during the 2016 campaign promoted the Green Party candidate Jill Stein, Politico reported Tuesday, while others boosted Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) campaign even after he dropped out of the race.
“Choose peace and vote for Jill Stein,” one ad says, according to Politico. “Trust me. It’s not a wasted vote. … The only way to take our country back is to stop voting for the corporations and banks that own us. #GrowaSpineVoteJillStein.”
Facebook has disclosed that about 3,000 ads were purchased by Russia’s Internet Research Agency, and those ads are now the focus of congressional investigators and Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s own probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election.
“The vast majority of ads run by these accounts didn’t specifically reference the U.S. presidential election or voting for a particular candidate. Rather, the ads and accounts appeared to focus on amplifying divisive social and political messages across the ideological spectrum — touching on topics from LGBT matters to race issues to immigration to gun rights,” Facebook said in a statement to Politico.
Some of the ads described to Politico by unnamed sources tracked along with the anti-immigration theme of President Donald Trump’s campaign, while others pulled other sides of political issues dividing U.S. political culture. One ad seemed to promote Muslim women support for Hillary Clinton, while another hyped the Black Lives Matter movement — misspelling the name Black Lives Matter, according to a Politico source.
“There is no indication Stein, Sanders or Trump was aware of the advertisements,” the Politico report said.
Facebook has reportedly turned over the ads and information related to their purchase to the Mueller probe. The Senate and House Intelligence Committees has started their own review of the ads as part of their respective investigations.
The fact that the race between The Most Qualified Candidate for President in the History of Forever and the Spittle-Sputtering Love Child of Augustus Gloop and an Oompa Loompa was close enough for these ads to have any significant effect on the election is an embarrassment for the Clinton Campaign and the DNC and is something they should be hanging their heads in shame over, not jumping up and down and pointing to…
All of the Jill Stein is the only true progressive candidate nonsense was aided by old grudges, like the infamous column below:
www.nytimes.com/opinion/sunday/donald-the-dove-hillary-the-hawk.html
Easier to just blame the Clinton campaign and the DNC then to look at all the factors.
And who do you think would have been a better candidate for the Dems? Do you remember what the GOPer machine did to Gore and Kerry? Same thing they did to Clinton only to the tenth power once she announced her candidacy. Before that she was the most popular/powerful woman in the world and re-elected to her senate seat from NY by 68% before her turn as Sec. of State. The character assassination campaign against Clinton by the left, right and center is something the world had not seen before. The character assassination against Sanders would have been no less evil and successful had he managed to win over the millions of votes that Clinton defeated him by in the primaries. Hard enough to fight right wing propaganda but almost impossible to get the truth out when it is combined with MSM and the leftist/purist wings.
Good thing she says it’s all fake or I might be inclined to believe this.