Bernie Sanders' campaign staffer John Mattes: We were Russian pawns.

[pnwmom]

From the UK's The Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/05/donald-trump-russia-investigation-fake-news-hillary-clinton

A huge wave of fake news stories originating from eastern Europe began washing over the presidential election months earlier, at the height of the primary campaign. John Mattes, who was helping run the outline campaign for the Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders from San Diego, said it really took off in March 2016.

“In a 30-day period, dozens of full-blown sites appeared overnight, running full level productions posts. It screamed out to me that something strange was going on,” Mattes said. Much of the material was untraceable, but he tracked 40% of the new postings back to eastern Europe.

SNIP

He was particularly struck by a report on 10 August that formed part of the dossier on the Russian interference campaign compiled by the former British intelligence officer, Christopher Steele, which quoted an unnamed Trump associate discussing a Russian-driven campaign to alienate Sanders supporters from Clinton.

“He was writing in real time about things I was seeing happening in August, but I couldn’t articulate until September,” he said. Because the Sanders online campaign was so open, democratic and relatively unregulated, Mattes says he now realises: “We basically set ourselves up to be victims of an international cyberwarfare campaign. We were pawns in this but very effective pawns.”

[brush]

1. Yep. Effective in turning voters against Clinton, and don't forget gullible too.

[calimary]

34. I knew it.

Divide and conquer. Set us upon each other to divide us so their guy could squeak by to steal a "win". Sure saw it here, and elsewhere too.

[nikibatts]

52. Hello, Nina, Susan...are you there?

No wonder Nina wants folks to think the Russian thing is no big deal.

[Cha]

80. Exactly, niki.. nina wants to sweep that under the

rug along with her good friend pawn for putin, stein.

Link to tweet

[Gothmog]

2. Yes russia used Sanders and the idiots on JPR

During the campaign, I would go count the number of obvious fake news stories planted on JPR. It was amazing. JPR eventually had to make a rule about pizzagate stories after there four or more such stories on the greatest page at one time.

Russia used Sanders supporting facebook groups and groups like JPR to spread fake news

[pnwmom]

3. They even tried posting that stuff here but we were better equipped to fight that,

thanks to Skinner, et al.

[brer cat]

5. They still did a lot of damage.

And the blood is still on some of our walls.

[Blue_true]

17. I watched. They turned DU members on eachother.

Members were savaging eachother for the most trivial of reasons. Anyone that said we agree if 85% of issues were attacked. Sad to watch that happen.

[CentralMass]

33. The vast majority of the electorate have no clue what DU and other sites are

Voters formed their opinions and made their choices from more convential news sources.


The party clearly had problems as evidenced by the 900 or so seats lost at the state level in the preceding 8 years and Hillary carried a lot of baggage and history along with her that was fodder for the right.

[brer cat]

46. All Democrats are fodder for the right.

Look at what they did to Kerry. Bernie would have been painted as a Communist. Democrats must stop doing the job for the republicans and Russians by turning on our own. We should be able to discuss issues without defiling our politicians in the process.

[CentralMass]

51. I don't have an argument with what you say but Hillary holds a special place in the GOP's

list. Having said rhtat, she almost overcame it and might have it weren't for the last minute Comey sh.t bomb. However, she had the baggage to make those (bs) attacks posdible.

As far as how Bernie would have stacked up against tRump, I guess we will never know. Polls seem to be favoring him against Trump at the end and his negative were much lower the tRump or Hillary.

[Gothmog]

63. Russia also used Sanders friendly facebook pages

Russia targeted Sanders supporters and the Russian fake new was effective.

[CentralMass]

72. I was a Sanders supporter in the primary and Russian backed or other propaganda had

zero impact on me
I disliked tRump long before he ran for President and would never vote for him. I voted for Hillary in the 2008 primary and voted for her in the general after she won the primary this go around
. I'm of the opinion that the number of registered Democrats who supported Bernie in the primary and did not vote for Hillary in the general were small in number.

[Caliman73]

87. I would agree with you there.

I don't think that there was as much division as has been stated. The biggest problem was apathy. As I have said many times. Only a little over 53% or 54% of eligible voters pulled a lever on election night. That was a bigger problem than internal division. That and the vote suppression and other dirty tricks, and the media working to promote Trump for the horse race.

[CentralMass]

88. +1

[MiddleClass]

6. JPR?

Journal of Peaceful Research?

[revmclaren]

10. Jackshit Preschool Repubs

[brer cat]

20. lol

[Gothmog]

62. LOL

[MiddleClass]

4. Now that was Russian involvement in cyber warfare

They were sewing needs of destruction and dissension.

Not changing vote machine totals

gullible, willing to be manipulated, as Malcolm Nance said useful fools

[Beartracks]

56. Ah, but they DID manipulate vote machine totals...

... by manipulating VOTERS.



============

[aikoaiko]

7. FWIW: I don't think Mattes was a Sanders campaign staffer.

He's been described as Facebook page administrator that supported Sanders when most of this story came out in March.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-fake-news-russia_us_58c34d97e4b0ed71826cdb36

[pnwmom]

8. Quibble about his title all you want -- he was a "major organizer" on the Bernie team.

http://timesofsandiego.com/politics/2017/03/23/russia-duped-bernie-fans-via-facebook-san-diego-dems-told/

A major Sanders organizer in Southern California himself, Mattes admitted that “we were played.”

Emmy Award-winning investigative journalist John Mattes of San Diego, a former Bernie Sanders organizer in Southern California, speaks March 23, 2017, to the San Diego Democrats for Equality club at the Joyce Beers Community Center in the Hillcrest area of San Diego. Mattes argues that his six-month review of Facebook pages devoted to Sanders reveals a concerted Russian attempt to “peel away” Bernie voters from Hillary Clinton via negative stories about the Democratic candidate, thus ensuring the election of Donald Trump. For a story and photos, see Times of San Diego at http://timesofsandiego.com/politics/2...

[aikoaiko]

12. My point is that Staffer implies employed by campaign professionally.

and I've not seen Mattes described as a major organizer.

Did you see him described as a staffer or did you create that title and role yourself?

He ran a legit pro-Sander Facebook page and is talking about Facebook organizers and others on social media.

[pnwmom]

14. Well now you HAVE seen him described as a major organizer, in addition to his other

serious credentials.

And not all staffers are employed by a campaign "professionally," whatever that means.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_campaign_staff

Political campaign staff are the people who formulate and implement the strategy needed to win an election. Many people have made careers out of working full-time for campaigns and groups that support them, but in other campaigns much of the staff might be unpaid volunteers.

[aikoaiko]

23. Still looking for that word major.

Well I can't argue with wiki that campaign staff are sometimes unpaid volunteers, but I've not heard of someone referred to as a staffer to a politician who wasn't employed.

[pnwmom]

25. I'll put it in capital letters so you don't miss it again. Here you go:

http://timesofsandiego.com/politics/2017/03/23/russia-duped-bernie-fans-via-facebook-san-diego-dems-told/

"A MAJOR Sanders organizer in Southern California himself, Mattes admitted that 'we were played.'”

[aikoaiko]

26. Thank you. I will concede the San Diego paper thinks he was a major organizer in their area.

[pnwmom]

29. And Raw Story refers to him as one of Sanders's "major backers" and "professional campaign staff."

Mattes's name is the first name mentioned in an article about Sanders "professional campaign staff" talking about the Russian trolls.

http://www.rawstory.com/2017/03/sanders-staffers-confirm-that-russian-trolls-were-pushing-anti-hillary-memes-on-social-networks-and-comment-threads/

Major Bernie Sanders backers suspect Russians flooded their social sites with anti-Hillary memes


Professional presidential campaign staff for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) confirmed to the Huffington Post that Russian trolls were responsible for pushing out anti-Hillary Clinton memes and social media content.

The shocking series of interviews revealed large Facebook groups supporting Sanders were inundated with content from people with no ties to the regions in which the pages were located. Former reporter John Mattes explained that his San Diego page became overwhelmed with anti-Clinton memes with messages he’d never heard coming out of the Sanders campaign. Instead, they were memes alleging Clinton used body doubles and murdered political opponents.

[aikoaiko]

38. Maybe we'll understand his role better someday.

[Justice]

78. Seems most of us understand it pretty well right now

[NCTraveler]

85. Has Cenk or Hartmann said it?

I won't believe a word you are pushing until it hits RT.

[Tarheel_Dem]

15. Are you saying that social media didn't play a huge role in the alienation of Sanders supporters...

from the Clinton team? If not, then the o.p. must be correct about Mattes' involvement in the campaign. We've heard the Trump camp try and distance themselves from certain folks in their campaign when it became inconvenient. Let's not repeat that pattern here.

[aikoaiko]

21. I think its really hard to say how much fake news impacted actual votes.

We can document the sites and stories, but how much it impacted actual votes is difficult to measure. I would expect it would have some impact.

We didn't see much of it here at DU and I didn't see much of it on Facebook, but I'm just one person who didn't join a lot of Bernie FB groups -- just a couple.

Most of the Bernie supporters here and from what I saw on Facebook had sincere and legit issues with HRC.

The primary wars were well underway before the documented wave of fake news stories emerged in the summer. Sure some Bernie supporters didn't vote for HRC, but that always happens.

[Tarheel_Dem]

28. It's not hard to say. The o.p., who was a campaign insider, says the Bernie camp "got played".

[aikoaiko]

30. Again. I don't think he was a campaign staffer or an insider. He ran a facebook page and organized.

I'll just say this -- it wasn't the Russian fake news that made me and most of the Bernie supporters I know have issues with HRC.

I'll bow out this point. You've been decent to me in this thread and I think its best that I stop now.

[pnwmom]

32. He WAS an insider and a major backer and a member of the campaign staff,

according to both the San Diego newspaper and Raw Story. And he is an investigative reporter and he studied this.

[mythology]

41. Which isn't a quantifiable measure

One can quantify how much Clinton's poll numbers dropped after the second Comey announcement. One can quantify how much Trump's numbers dropped after the Access Hollywood tape came out.

This can't be easily measured to determine the impact, no matter who says it.

[GusBob]

9. How gullible, ignorant and bereft of reading comprehension are we?

Putin played our country like a drum.

What do Americans like to do? We stare endlessly& mindlessly at our devices, so he put out things to read which confirmed prejudices ( Clinton fatigue or hate in this case).

Consider yesterday when NPR tweeted the declaration of independence for the 4th of July, and people thought it was leftist propaganda!

Smdh

[hurple]

11. This was a coordinated attack

On Hillary Clinton on several fronts, to the left with the Bernie crowd, and to the right with the trump crowd.

They worked every angle, and told every lie, possible to turn everybody against HRC.

And she still won the popular vote by 3,000,000, and *barely* lost the EC.

(Although, at this point I don't believe she lost the EC, either. I fully believe with every ounce of my being that there is already enough evidence to prove, resoundingly, that the vote totals were hacked and shifted to little-hands baby-man.)

[StevieM]

19. The FBI did plenty of damage with their illegitimate actions. (eom)

[mythology]

42. There is zero evidence any votes were changed

No matter how much you believe it.

[Roy Rolling]

48. Prove it

There is zero evidence. So far, no states have done a forensic analysis. And Mueller has just begun. I am not a votes were changed crusader, just a logical thinker.

At this date, there is no public evidence votes were affected (changed, omitted, added, voter ID challenge) NOR proof that no votes were affected, either.

[GulfCoast66]

67. Please read about proving a negative

The assumption is that elections are clean. If you were going to claim they are not, evidence must be provided. Otherwise you will be taken as a crank. Maybe not to me, but to the populist as a whole.

I think they had no need to actually hack the vote. Their propaganda campaign did the job for them.

When I was reading the horrible things said about Hillary on DU I knew we were sunk.

If the 2020 primary has such a bitter fight between the left wing of the left leaning Democratic Party, and the part of the party that actually wins primaries, Trump will be reelected.

Because the Russians will be back at it.

[RandySF]

76. It's the fact it happened that counts.

[hurple]

90. Absolutely not true

There is no examined evidence, but evidence has been uncovered and then quickly swept under the rug with a "don't look at this" from the msm.

And there are stories about how the ic is specifically NOT looking into the evidence that does exist so it won't call into question the integrity of our election process.

[lunamagica]

49. +1 Great post! I agree with every word you said.

[pandr32]

54. Exactly;

Every ounce of my being agrees with you!

[Tarheel_Dem]

13. And I'll guarantee that Assange and Greenwald were at the tip of that particular spear. Sad. nt

[AngryAmish]

16. Just like the Russians are going after Pelosi.

And all those Americans jumping up to dance to the Russian tune.

[nini]

18. I was fucking saying this for a year and I was mocked by those who couldn't handle the truth

Sadly being able to say I TOLD YOU SO isn't too satisfying right now.

[NYResister]

22. They were. And it was obvious.

[calimary]

36. Welcome to DU, NYResister!

Gotta say - I suspected as much, for a long time, but as soon as I heard about the micro-targeting efforts, I knew it.

In June 2015 the National Review published an article urging CONS to support Bernie Sanders - specifically to hurt Hillary.

DAYUM, can't believe how threatened too many folks were by her. Over nothing but LIES told about her. But they were predisposed to embrace anything negative about her because she'd beaten their candidate. And I put Jill Stein's gullibles in there, too.

I find that I'm now triggered to look askance at anyone who says they voted for trump, either because they voted FOR him, or voted against HRC - for whatever lame-ass poor-excuse bullshit "rationale."

[David__77]

24. Millions of Democrats can be proud that they voted for Sanders.

I know that I am.

[pnwmom]

31. In the primary -- but not the ones who were stupid enough to write his name in the general.

Those Sanders backers helped elect DT.

[sammythecat]

61. Do you have any election statistics to support that claim?

What states would Hillary have won if not for the write-in votes for Sanders?

[pnwmom]

64. Anyone who didn't vote for Hillary helped DT. Some who were prevented from voting can't be blamed.

But anyone who chose to throw their vote away is partly responsible.

[sammythecat]

68. So, no stats to show that if the write-ins for Sanders

were instead votes for Hillary she would have won. That is what I asked about because it seems that the write-ins were such a small percentage of the vote that they had no effect on the result. If they'd all voted for Hillary she still would have lost the electoral college.

[karynnj]

71. Depends what state

If HRC won, it did not matter.

[pnwmom]

74. No one could know that except retroactively. Vote tampering could have happened in any state

and changed the results.

[karynnj]

79. The first stated called for Clinton was Vermont

There was no way Trump was going to come close and I think the whole state has paper ballots. From the tallies I saw, Bernie did get write in votes - likely cast as protest votes. A large majority here voted for Clinton in the general AND Bernie in the primary.

[politicaljunkie41910]

39. And how did that work out for you? "Pride goeth before the fall."

You just proved yourself to be an example of the proverb. People who are overconfident or too arrogant are likely to fail. And in failing you got nothing.

[Thinkingabout]

27. We have to look at all Russian propaganda as such, information released by Wikileaks is trash,

RW talking points is propaganda is more of the same also. As a lifelong Democrat, I plan to continue my life as a Democrat, electing Democrats is a priority, the DNC platform will do more to equalize everyone rather than protecting the 1%.

[betsuni]

35. I suppose it's too much to ask that this doesn't happen again.

I left several online groups last year because I spent all my time debunking fake news and nobody believed me, it was deeply upsetting. I wonder if any of them will now admit how stupid they were, doubt it. I fail to see the point of spending ridiculous amounts of money and time on higher education if one falls for the most absurdly transparent propaganda. At least if you never read or pay attention to current events you have an excuse for being gullible.

[calimary]

37. I know how you feel.

I kept trying, too. In various situations. And some people just would not hear. Would NOT take delivery. Would NOT be convinced. I know a few who, even now, are keeping up a brave front that trump's gonna be okay, just wait - he'll start getting it... any day now... wait for it... I'm going to remain hopeful... I just KNOW it... there MUST be a pony... under all that horse shit, there just simply MUST be a pony...

It's extremely difficult to have to admit to being wrong. It's even harder to have to admit one has been royally HAD. That's just human nature. NOBODY wants to look like a chump.

[betsuni]

45. The ones I was dealing with weren't Trump supporters.

They were Glenn Greenwald/Snowden/Wikileaks/Daily Mail/Obama's-droning-children-and-syping-on-us types, and when the presidential election season started and the Hillary Clinton conspiracy theories flooded the internet, they became rabid Hillary haters, and kind of anything-American haters. I had tried and tried to convince them that Democrats and Republicans were very different and that the Obama administration would NOT start WWIII, nor would Hillary Clinton, and remind them that the UK and France and Germany were also involved in military events with the U.S., but ... nope. Once the Hillary stuff started, it was too much.

I was offended that they didn't trust me. Frustrating!

[calimary]

53. I was dealing with some of those as well.

Anyone who was ripe for planting seeds of Hillary hate was a potential target. If they were already leaning against voting for her, loads of "reasons" presented themselves to give a nice firm shove to that tilt, in some cases pushing the target all the way over onto the ground.

I'm still amazed at what some Hillary haters believed, and how hot their hatred burned. I still don't understand it. It still makes absolutely no sense.

[betsuni]

59. I hope someone's writing a book about it right now.

It's like a mass delusion or something, I want to know how it happened.

[R B Garr]

91. +1, and it's still out there.

[Me.]

40. I've Wanted To Know

Did Devine have any connection to this and what actually happened to the Clinton files that were lifted?

[m-lekktor]

43. I can't wait to one day see an itemized list of "fake" news items we gullible Berniebros fell for.

what exactly was it that wasn't true that we so naively believed that was planted by the russians? I can't wait to find out! :O

[pnwmom]

44. I don't think Bernie supporters on DU are representative of the millions of less informed

Bernie supporters who might have been duped.

I spoke to one that summer, who had switched from Bernie to DT, because he had swallowed too much of the Hillary hate. He parroted a bunch of garbage and there was no reasoning with him.

[emulatorloo]

65. Honestly, why do you think every post is about you? You didn't fall for the Russian smear campaign

But if you visit Reddit you will find many BoB's who did. They believe every CT out there, etc.

You never posted stories from RT smearing Democrats, but other DU'ers (who are no longer here) did.

There is no need for you to be so damn defensive. It isn't about you. I was a Bernie primary supporter but I didn't fall for this shit either.

We are not Bob's. This thread is not about you or the Bernie supporters on DU.

[pnwmom]

66. +1

[aikoaiko]

69. But the comments in this thread show that the OP acted as an invite

To disparage DU Bernie supporters.

The Rissians are hardly even mentioned.

[enid602]

47. Pawn

thin line between 'being used as pawns' and outright collusion.

[murielm99]

55. Some of them are still being used as pawns.

Look at all the people here in this very thread backpedaling over Mattes. When I talk to the our revolution types, IRL, and on the internet, they parrot the same talking points. Some of them use the same words when they speak. They repeat whole sentences and phrases without stopping to think about what they mean.

We need to end this now. How? Sanders needs to stop criticizing the Democratic Party. He needs to step up and curb his followers.

[enid602]

57. Taxes

And he needs to release his goddamn taxes.

[murielm99]

58. +1

[betsuni]

60. +1

[aikoaiko]

70. Step up and curb his followers?

That's not how this works.

[murielm99]

75. It certainly is how it works.

When they try to tear down Democratic leaders like Corey Booker, throw people out of their meetings because they voted for Hillary? Suggest primarying good Democrats? Badmouth Nancy Pelosi? Who are these people? They represent probably 1% or 2% of "Democrats," but they make an inordinate amount of noise.

They idolize Bernie and do whatever he asks. He can curb them and he should. They are only helping trump.

[DemSoc]

81. +1. n/t

[aikoaiko]

82. I don't think you've been paying attention to the different groups of Bernie supporters.

Most are already on board with supporting the Democratic party and maybe include a little criticism of the party.

But the ones you're talking about aren't the types where Bernie can "bring them to heel," to borrow a phrase.

They don't idolize Bernie and do whatever he asks. In fact, that's true of most Bernie supporters as far as I can tell.

[JI7]

73. We Focus a Lot on the Election but the Russian Crap went on for some years before that

all that assange, greenwald and other crap .

i think it is all a continuation .

[Voltaire2]

77. Actual headline: Investigators explore if Russia colluded with pro-Trump sites during US election

[pnwmom]

84. A headline is merely what a headline writer chooses to highlight. I noticed something else.

Which was that Mattes, as a campaign organizer and an investigative journalist, says the Russians had specifically and successfully targeted propaganda at Bernie supporters, and that the campaign was especially vulnerable because of its openness.

[rockfordfile]

83. I don't buy it from Mr.Mattes

I think they didn't care or supported what Russia was doing.

[Hekate]

86. John Mattes is a brave man to admit that. He's owed our thanks for saying it out loud.

We live in terrifying times.

[Blue_Tires]

89. I'm glad to hear that from one of the inside guys

because I'd catch hell if I said it myself...

[ehrnst]

92. And not a word from Senator Sanders. (nt)

[ehrnst]

93. VT public Radio:

Link to tweet

"I did not know Russian bots were promoting my campaign."

"The real question to be asked is" why the Clinton campaign didn't do something.