Seeing Red: Russian Propaganda in American News

• In Event: Foreign Influence Operations, Propaganda, and Sharp Power

Abstract

The convergence of strategic narratives from U.S. President Donald Trump and the Kremlin created historic opportunities for Russia’s global propaganda war. Yet, how did this happen and will the phenomenon repeat in 2024 and other elections? How can political scientists better understand how to identify and track foreign propaganda narratives in a U.S. media system challenged by domestic disinformation? This paper analyzes how messages from Trump have been amplified by politicians and U.S. news outlets that favor propaganda over information. Through the 2020 election, the Stop the Steal conspiracy, and the Capitol insurrection, Russians found myriad ways to publicize the end of American democracy and the rise of Russia. Identifying and tracking four key Russian strategic narratives—democracy is flawed and failing, resurgent Russia, protecting Russians abroad, and the West is out to destroy Russia—allows us to better understand how Russian propaganda finds echoes in U.S. news. Despite knowledge of the risk and resourceful work by analysts and journalists in tracking down Russian propaganda in the United States, the problem of foreign disinformation continues to this day and plays a key role in Russia’s current war in Ukraine. This analysis deploys both traditional political communication methods such as content analysis as well as computational methods to leverage our insights at a greater scale. In particular, this analysis considers the operationalization of the concept of “strategic narrative” (Miskimmon, O’Louglin, and Roselle) in the political communication field as a way to tag and track specific propaganda narratives in domestic media spheres. Overall, we find that narrative tracking can work, although it is limited to specific narratives that have rather unique linguistic resonance. It does, however, allow scholars to usefully move beyond the conundrum of intentionality with misinformation and disinformation and demonstrate how powerful storylines can be deployed as weapons of mass deception.

Reference: Miskimmon, Alister, Ben O’Loughlin and Laura Roselle (eds.). 2017. Forging the World: Strategic Narratives and International Relations. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan.

Authors

• Sarah A. Oates, University of Maryland

• Gordon Ramsay, University of Akureyri