President Donald Trump stops to talk to the media before walking across the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Monday, Oct. 22, 2018, to board Marine One helicopter for a short trip to Andrews Air Force Base, Md., en route to Houston. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) | AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais Fourth Estate What’s the Difference Between Trump and a Russian Twitter Troll? One’s a 44-year-old accountant who faces five years in prison on federal charges. The other is the president.

Jack Shafer is Politico’s senior media writer.

What’s the difference between Donald Trump and Elena Khusyaynova, the 44-year-old Russian accountant who faces five years in prison if convicted on federal charges brought against her Friday for conspiring to interfere in the U.S. political system and the 2018 midterm election via social media messages and advertisements?

Are there any differences? After you factor out the obvious incongruities—age, nationality, gender, city of residence, and employer—Donald and Elena share so much in terms of political style and substance, we should expect a presidential pardon for her and maybe even a White House ceremony in which Trump will loop a Presidential Medal of Freedom around her neck.


Much of what smells like criminal conspiracy to the Department of Justice in the Khusyaynova case—”sow division and discord in the U.S. political system”; “address divisive U.S. political and social issues”; “advocate for the election or electoral defeat of particular candidates”; stage and promote “political rallies inside the United States”; inflame “passions on a wide variety of topics, including immigration, gun control and the Second Amendment, the Confederate flag, race relations, LGBT issues, the Women’s March, and the NFL national anthem debate”—could easily be mistaken for an average Twitter week for the president. When is he not sowing division and discord on these issues? When is he not advocating for somebody’s defeat? And who loves to stage and promote political rallies inside the United States more than Trump?

I’m OK with all of you quibblers who will step up now to object that Khusyaynova and “Project Lakhta,” whose finances she masterminded and directed, did their politicking through fake personas and bogus social media accounts and Trump does his sowing under his own signature. But setting that aside, many of the Russian rants collected in the criminal complaint overlay Trump’s tweets almost perfectly.

For instance, Project Lakhta members at the Facebook group “Secured Borders” gave these Trumpian tips on what to write on social media platforms. “Brand [Sen. John] McCain as an old geezer who has lost it and who long ago belonged in a home for the elderly.” Speaker Paul Ryan was to be branded as “a complete and absolute nobody incapable of any decisiveness.” Special counsel Robert Mueller? “[A] puppet of the establishment.” Sen. Marco Rubio? “[A] fake conservative who is a traitor to Republican values and who in his soul despises the American Constitution and civil liberties.” The leadership in sanctuary cities should be characterized as having “lost all connection with reality” and “trying to provide criminals who illegally crossed the U.S. borders with voting rights that are available only to the citizens of the United States.”

Compare these Russian fakes with genuine expressions from the president’s keyboard. Today he tweeted, “Sadly, it looks like Mexico’s Police and Military are unable to stop the Caravan heading to the Southern Border of the United States. Criminals and unknown Middle Easterners are mixed in. I have alerted Border Patrol and Military that this is a National Emergy. Must change laws!” On Friday he wrote, “Beto O’Rourke is a total lightweight compared to Ted Cruz, and he comes nowhere near representing the values and desires of the people of the Great State of Texas. He will never be allowed to turn Texas into Venezuela!” Last week, he thumbed this gem of discord and division: “Thank you to the Cherokee Nation for revealing that Elizabeth Warren, sometimes referred to as Pocahontas, is a complete and total Fraud!” At a Saturday political rally in Elko, Nevada, Trump claimed that people in California who dislike sanctuary cities are “rioting now. They want to get out of their sanctuary cities.”

To be fair to Khusyaynova and her alleged paymaster, Yevgeny Prigozhin—the sanctioned Russian oligarch who goes by the nickname “Putin’s chef” and was indicted in February for election meddling by Mueller—some of Project Lakhta’s work tilted against Trump. For example, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was targeted in one campaign. Tweets directing the masses to take to the streets in protest should Trump can Mueller were disseminated. And a tweet about Republicans banning women’s health care choices was retweeted. But the basic thrust of Project Lakhta appears to have been in support of Trump and against his opponents.

“The strategic goal of this alleged conspiracy, which continues to this day, is to sow discord in the U.S. political system and to undermine faith in our democratic institutions,” said U.S. Attorney G. Zachary Terwilliger. Terwilliger was speaking of Khusyuaynova in this press release, but he could just as easily been describing Trump’s anti-democratic onslaught of the past two years.

Trump threatened he might not accept the results of the 2016 election should he be declared the loser. He attacks judges whose rulings he disagrees with. He praises dictators. He continues to make bogus claims about massive voter fraud. And he’s been spreading disinformation heading into the midterm elections. By any rational measure, he’s a greater underminer of faith in our democratic institutions that a pack of devious Russians practicing social-media mischief. While I’m fine with the Department of Justice throwing the book at the meddling Russians halfway around the world, what about the shenanigans just 6½ blocks from DOJ headquarters on Pennsylvania Avenue NW?

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