Time to Shine a Light on Putin's American Propaganda Arm

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Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of Russian broadcaster RT, with the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in the background in Moscow on October 17. Elena Postnikova writes that RT should be registered as an agent of the... Maxim Shemetov/reuters

This article first appeared on the Atlantic Council site.

Russia used RT, its TV channel, to influence the recent U.S. elections.

This was the finding of the recently declassified U.S. intelligence report. It concluded that Russia implemented a multifaceted campaign involving disclosures of data obtained through hacking, intrusions into state and local electoral boards and propaganda.

While the American elite is debating an appropriate response, they are ignoring an existing tool—the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938 (FARA). As an immediate step to counter the Kremlin's influence campaign, the U.S. government should enforce FARA against RT to alert the American people to Russia's efforts and limit the country's ability to disguise its "information warfare" as legitimate media activity.

This is not the first time a foreign country has directed "information warfare" against the United States. Similar tactics were also used by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.

To address Nazi propaganda activities in the 1930s, Congress adopted FARA, which required persons advancing foreign interests to register as "agents of foreign principals," who were required to disclose their activities and the nature of their employment. The act aimed to ensure the American people would not be misled into thinking they were receiving information from disinterested sources. During the Cold War, representatives of Soviet news outlets (TASS, Pravda, Izvestia and others) were registered agents. There is a lesson here.

As a disclosure statute, FARA does not prohibit, edit or restrain an agent's ability to distribute information. Rather, it compels disclosure of the origin and purpose of the information to help its audience develop an accurate understanding of the source. In doing so, it does not suppress freedom of speech; instead, it serves the First Amendment with supplemental information available to the public.

RT should be registered as an agent of the Russian government because, as FARA states, it acts under the "direction or control" of its foreign principal, and engages in "political activities" in the interest of its foreign principal.

RT engages in "political activities" since its reporting intends to influence the U.S. government and public in order to affect U.S. domestic and foreign policy. RT's coverage of the recent elections and its impact on public discussion is just one such example.

RT denies that it is subject to the Kremlin's "direction or control" because of its formation as an " autonomous nonprofit organization," TV-Novosti. But this assertion is misleading. Even if a media nonprofit could be considered independent in Russia, in the United States such legal formality has little weight if it doesn't reflect the reality.

In truth, we know of "not very many" occurrences in Russia that take place without President Vladimir Putin's knowledge—"certainly none that are politically sensitive in other countries," according to U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, when testifying before the Senate on foreign cyber threats.

Ofcom, the U.K. communications regulator, investigated complaints against RT and found nine episodes in the last two years when its reporting was in breach of broadcasting standards on impartiality. Each incident of bias coincided with the Kremlin's policy goals in Ukraine, Turkey and Syria. No other media outlet was close to having as many violations in such a short period of time.

RT claims it does not qualify as a foreign agent under FARA because it operates in the U.S. through a commercial entity to whom RT "simply transfers funds." What we know of as RT in the United States are two Washington, D.C.–registered entities—RTTV America, Inc., and RTTV Studios, LLC, both of which are owned and controlled by Russian-born businessman Alex Yazlovsky.

These entities are RT's contractors, which produce video content, tape shows and provide crew services and studio facilities for RT, as well as transmit content to its audience. RT operates similarly in the U.K., where it contracts its services from a local " supplier," Russia Today TV Ltd. It's hard to believe that RT's U.S. contractors are fully independent from the client who pays for its custom-made products and services.

According to the law, FARA does not apply to foreign news organizations that engage in "bona fide news or journalistic activities." Such media are usually not owned, directed, supervised, controlled, subsidized, or financed or have their policies determined by any foreign principal.

For example, the U.K.'s BBC and Germany's Deutsche Welle are considered exempt from FARA because their governance structure protects their editorial policies and maintains their independence from government influence; there is no indication that they are "directed or controlled" by their governments. For this same reason, RT would have hard time proving that it qualifies for this exemption.

When former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul suggested last month that perhaps RT's employees should be accredited as foreign agents rather than journalists, RT responded with personal attacks, threats of retaliation against American journalists, accusations of infringement on press freedom and complaints that the Russian media are treated unfairly. Their fierce response, however, is not a good reason to avoid FARA enforcement.

Registration would require RT to label its information as "distributed by an agent on behalf of the foreign principal." Such disclosure would alert the public to the purpose of RT's reporting. But it would have no effect on RT's ability to continue working in the United States, conduct broadcasting from its Washington, D.C. studio, or otherwise operate as it had prior to registration.

In any case, RT journalists would continue to enjoy more press freedom in the United States than U.S. journalists in Russia.

Elena Postnikova is a JD candidate at Georgetown University Law Center.

Uncommon Knowledge

Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.

Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.

About the writer

Elena Postnikova

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