Fake online news, allegedly generated by Russian sources? Schultz, a North Dakotan who once considered running for the U.S. Senate as a Democrat, thinks it’s all “fear and hype” by the American news media and a smear by the Democratic Party, especially Clinton.
“If they [the American media] want to go after fake news, they can start with the Clinton campaign and their accusations” about Russian involvement, he said on a broadcast in September.
RT America’s approach to the news makes some American officials and foreign-policy observers wonder: Is it merely “an alternative voice,” as it likes to say, or something more sinister?
Stanford professor Michael McFaul, the former American ambassador to Russia, calls RT “an instrument of the Russian state. Their mission is to advance the mission of Mr. Putin and the [Russian] government.”
By mimicking the look and feel of an American newscast — even to the extent of permitting an occasional dissent from the Kremlin-centric line — RT is trying to “disguise” its real intent, he said.
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