Russian state media profited by reporting true stories about U.S. failings.

Evidence

In any case, Sputnik and RT’s activities post-2016 were not new. They have long focused on true but unflattering aspects of American government to shape a narrative. They had plenty of material to work from: police violence, gun violence, government repression, enthusiastic drone use. With the exception of reporting by Sean Stone—director Oliver Stone’s adult son and an enthusiastic conspiracy theorist—a lot of their coverage looked like typical journalism. — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 962

Categorization

• XREF: The mechanism — foreign media weaponizing genuine American failings — parallels how native-born conspiracy content in earlier chapters exploited genuine grievances.