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Donald Trump
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Politico | How an anti-Trump flash mob found itself in the middle of Russian meddling

  • Russia’s Internet Research Agency spent US$80 to buy ads on Facebook to promote the anti-president Les Mis flash mob on July 4, 2017
  • The saga is a timely warning of just how vulnerable the US continues to be to sophisticated foreign machinations as it heads into another campaign cycle

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Activists at the Les Mis flash mob. Photo: YouTube
POLITICO

This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Nina Jankowicz on politico.com on July 5, 2020.

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On October 19, 2018, a criminal complaint in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election was unsealed. It lays out how the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency funded and implemented its online influence campaigns in the United States. The level of detail is astonishing. The complaint uncovers the budget of the so-called troll factory, or, as Mueller refers to it, “the Conspiracy.” It reveals the Conspiracy’s organisational structure. It details communications between employees of the IRA.

But one detail in particular stood out to me when the complaint was unsealed. “On or about July 1, 2017,” the complaint reads, “a member of the Conspiracy … contact[ed] the Facebook accounts for three real US organisations to inquire about collaborating with these groups on an anti-President Trump ‘flash mob’ at the White House, which was already being organised by the groups for July 4, 2017.”

This detail was shockingly familiar; community theatre has always been a hobby of mine, and I recalled friends posting about an Independence Day flash mob.

They planned to dress in colonial attire at the height of Washington’s muggy summer to sing a parody of “Do You Hear the People Sing?,” the famous revolutionary anthem from the musical Les Miserables, in front of the so-called people’s house. The event page for the flash mob has long since been removed from Facebook, but in the age of live-streaming, it wasn’t difficult for me to find videos of the festivities.

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In the Facebook and YouTube videos I found, several hundred people gathered in front of the White House on a sunny, sweaty Washington Independence Day. A young guy in a Revolutionary War get-up complete with tri-corner hat and a waistcoat addressed the crowd:

“Hear ye, hear ye, citizens!” he began, ringing a handbell. “Resist the rule of the treasonous King Donald” – the crowd interrupted him, cheering – “who has betrayed the republic and offered his soul and conscience to the Tsar of Russia and consigned American welfare to ruin. Declare your independence from this … stupid, stubborn, worthless, brutish man! God save the United States!” The crowd waved their American flags and cheered.

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