A MAGA Meltdown

The Russian influence peddling scandal begins to mount casualties.

The reverberations from indictments this week over Russian influence buying continue to spread.

Yesterday, I wrote about how the Kremlin used a series of shell companies to funnel nearly $10 million to a company called Tenet Media, based in Tennessee. That’s the now former home of some of the most powerful voices of the online right: Dave Rubin, Tim Pool, Benny Johnson, Lauren Southern, Tayler Hansen and Matt Christiansen.

These commentators were the faces of Tenet Media’s YouTube channel, where the company had gathered them together to provide an “alternative” to the mainstream media. Podcaster and right-wing troll Tim Pool, who never seems to remove his beanie, proclaimed that Tenet would be a YouTube “supergroup” that would compete with the untrustworthy mainstream outlets.

Superspreader group is more like it. Those six commentators pumped out Kremlin propaganda and disinformation in thousands of videos with millions of views, all while being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars. But with the Department of Justice having now indicted two Russian nationals and implicated the founders of Tenet in a massive influence peddling scandal, it has all come crashing down.

In today’s piece, I’ll explore a bit more of the rise and quick fall of Tenet. Then I’ll discuss the shockwaves that the right-wing echo chamber is experiencing and how some major personalities are trying to cope.

Tenet Media: A Russian ops front

The idea behind Tenet Media should have set off alarm bells for the six commentators who were recruited to be its face. After all, each of them was already something of an online star in their own right, and it didn’t make much sense to gather them all together under one roof as part of a new, unknown company. Still, Tenet’s founders included well known conservative extremist Lauren Chen and her husband Liam Donovan. And it was a company flush with cash—and that probably sealed the deal for them.

The six MAGA villains proceeded to make promo videos about Tenet. Christiansen, who is big on YouTube, really should have trusted his own instincts. He even mused aloud, “What if I’ve been duped, what if this is all a ruse?” But he also posited whether it would be “a lot harder” to take down their voices “when we’re grouped together in this way.” 

Welp. In response to the indictment, YouTube just deleted the entire Tenet Media channel. That’s some 2,000 videos with over 315,000 subscribers.

But looking at the channel’s metrics more closely, at least before it got deleted, it was clear that the videos themselves weren’t getting much individual traction. The views often were just in the thousands. There was simply no way the channel could possibly be earning enough in advertising to cover the huge fees of the content creators. 

These are savvy online influencers represented by lawyers, and they ought to have wondered why some unknown Belgian backer (going by the name of Eduard Grigoriann) would have poured so much money into a losing endeavor.

The commentators have nevertheless cried that they are innocent victims, with only Lauren Southern not yet issuing a statement. But somehow none of these personalities (or their lawyers or accountants) ever once wondered why they were being paid so much to create and amplify this content.

And paraphrasing the folks at The Bulwark, who wondered, “Since you’re all victims, you’re going to return the money they paid you, right?”

All this of course raises another serious question: Who else have the Russians bought? After all, $10 million is a small amount to a government like Russia (or Egypt for that matter). But to individuals like these far-right influencers, or to a certain ex-president nearing financial insolvency, $10 million could be life changing.

Don’t talk to anyone

It’s fair to say that these indictments are likely the beginning, and not the end, of a wider inquiry. Far-right media seems to understand this well and is circling the wagons.

Following the indictments, Lauren Chen, who has not been charged (yet) with anything, was nevertheless immediately fired from her position at BlazeTV, which is part of the right-wing Blaze Media group founded by former Fox host Glenn Beck. Blaze Media was quick to point out that Chen was only a “contractor” with the company and that her contract was terminated.

Podcaster Dan Bongino, who is not affiliated with Tenet, still took the time to warn listeners not to talk to others:

I’d be remiss, as a former federal agent, to not warn people that, given these accusations, are other people—I’m not accusing anyone specifically, I want to be clear—are people working with the feds right now to try to ensnare other conservative influencers into this alleged, alleged operation.

Benny Johnson’s interviewees, which included Lara Trump, Don Jr. and top Trump campaign officials, also probably wish they had never sat for Johnson’s videos or praised his work. 

A Pool of tears

Our Schadenfriday would not be complete without checking in on podcaster Tim Pool, who was busy posting yesterday, apparently in a lame attempt at sarcasm, about his complete change of heart on Ukraine aid.

Pool also ridiculed the notion that he was funded by the Russians.

(Narrator: Pool was in fact funded by the Russians.)

But then reality appears to have hit, with Pool letting his Twitter followers know he would be assisting the FBI in its investigation after they contacted him.

What’s the phrase I’m looking for here? Oh yes. Thoughts and prayers, Tim.