Elections and Media

Fox News has canceled ads purchased by Democratic mega-donor Tom Steyer that call for President Donald Trump’s impeachment, CNN’s Brian Stelter confirmed. “Due to the strong negative reaction to their ad by our viewers, we could not in good conscience take their money,” Fox News told Stelter. Steyer said that Fox News informed him on Oct.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said he believes technology companies that displayed Kremlin-linked ads during the 2016 election could help the United States “retaliate” against Russia. “What we ought to do with regard to the Russians is retaliate, seriously retaliate against the Russians,” Sen McConnell told MSNBC’s Hugh Hewitt.

US lawmakers say Russia's use of social media in the 2016 presidential election amounts to cyberwarfare. Sens Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Angus King (I-ME) both used that term to describe Russian accounts and advertising that sowed division among Americans by promoting fake news and even protests. "This country has to have some kind of cyberwarfare deterrent capacity," Sen King said. "Right now, there's no price to be paid for meddling in our democracy." But there's no explicit definition or legal framework in the United States for what constitutes cyberwar.

President Donald Trump on Nov 3 pressured the Department of Justice — and specifically the FBI — to investigate Hillary Clinton, ticking through a slew of issues involving the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee and her party, and urging law enforcement to “do what is right and proper.” President Trump's advocacy for criminal probe of his political opponent marked a significant breach of the traditional boundaries within the executive branch designed to prevent investigations from being politicized. In a series of Friday morning tweets, President Trump claimed there was mounting public pre

On Oct 31’s technology-executive hearings before the Senate Intelligence Committee, a key tension at the heart of the internet emerged: Do American tech companies, such as Twitter, Facebook, and Google, operate as American companies? Or are they in some other global realm, maybe in some place called cyberspace?

Apparently, the Justice Department has identified more than six members of the Russian government involved in hacking the Democratic National Committee’s computers and swiping sensitive information that became public during the 2016 presidential election. Prosecutors and agents have assembled evidence to charge the Russian officials and could bring a case in 2018. Discussions about the case are in the early stages, apparently. If filed, the case would provide the clearest picture yet of the actors behind the DNC intrusion. U.S.

On Nov 1, Congress released some of the 3,000 Facebook ads and Twitter accounts created by Russian operatives to sway American voters.  These disturbing messages, seen by up to 126 million Americans, raise thorny questions about Silicon Valley’s responsibility for vetting the information it publishes.

Lawmakers on Nov 1 released a trove of ads that Russian operatives bought on Facebook, providing the fullest picture yet of how foreign actors sought to promote Republican Donald Trump, denigrate Democrat Hillary Clinton and divide Americans over some of the nation’s most sensitive social issues. The ads that emerged, a sampling of the 3,000 that Russians bought during the 2016 presidential campaign and its aftermath, demonstrated in words and images a striking ability to mimic American political discourse at its most fractious.

Senators who called tech giants to Capitol Hill on Nov 1 to answer for their roles in Russia’s election interference differed along party lines over the Kremlin’s role in swaying the race, with Republicans offering an implicit defense of the legitimacy of President Donald Trump’s victory. After months of publicly sidestepping the issue, several Republicans used a high-profile hearing with executives of Facebook, Google and Twitter to dismiss the impact of Russia’s use of the sites to spread misinformation and buy ads to try to tip the election in President Trump’s favor.

On October 23, 2017, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai responded to multiple Members of Congress regarding First Amendment freedoms and the independence of the FCC. Numerous lawmakers, notably House Commerce Committee Ranking Member Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), Communications Subcommittee Ranking Member Michael Doyle (D-PA), and Rep Anna Eshoo (D-CA), had written to Chairman Pai over the influence of a radio network funded by the Russian government being used on U.S. airwaves to influence the 2016 presidential election.