CHARLOTTE, NC (Bruce Henderson and Steve Harrison/The Charlotte Observer) – The Russian troll farm suspected of trying to disrupt U.S. elections last year apparently infiltrated Charlotte during racial protests last year, BuzzFeed News reports.
The online news site says the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency recruited U.S. activists to help stage protests in order to help divide the nation ahead of the 2016 elections.
Conrad James of the Raleigh nonprofit Living Ultra-Violet was among four activists who told BuzzFeed they never suspected they were being recruited by the Russians.
James told the news site he was contacted by BlackMattersUS, which the Russian news outlet RBC linked to the Russian troll farm. James said BlackMattersUS asked him to speak at a rally following the September 2016 police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott, which sparked two days of protests.
“I thought it was a knockoff of Black Lives Matter,” James told BuzzFeed, but its website appeared legitimate.
AAN Staff
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