Russian actors were behind a viral video falsely showing mail-in ballots for Donald Trump being destroyed in the swing state of Pennsylvania, US officials said on Friday, amid heightened alert over foreign influence operations targeting the coming election.
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The video, which garnered millions of views on platforms such as the Elon Musk-owned X, purports to show a man sorting through mail-in ballots from the state’s Bucks County and ripping up those cast for Trump.
On Thursday, the Bucks County Board of Elections declared the video as “fake,” saying that the envelope and other materials depicted in the footage are “clearly not authentic materials” belonging to or distributed by them.
In a joint statement on Friday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said the video was part of a Russian disinformation operation.
“Russian actors manufactured and amplified a recent video that falsely depicted an individual ripping up ballots in Pennsylvania,” the statement said.
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“This Russian activity is part of Moscow’s broader effort to raise unfounded questions about the integrity of the US election and stoke divisions among Americans,” it added.
The statement said Russia was expected to create and release more such content in an attempt to “undermine trust” in the integrity of the November 5 elections.