New Study Finds Russia Had No Measurable Impact in Changing Minds in 2016 Election

For six years, Democrats were united in their belief that Donald Trump was helped by Russia and Vladimir Putin.

Trump’s Democratic opponent that year, Hillary Clinton, has This is what I said. Nancy Pelosi, former Democratic Speaker of House This is what I said. Chuck Schumer, Democratic Senate Majority Leader has This is what I said. MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow made a career off of Say this. . This is what you should believe.

Here we go again, again.

“These tactics echo Russian election interference on social media four years ago when operatives working for the Kremlin-backed Internet Research Agency focused heavily on America’s racial divisions.”https://t.co/GdIX9T2zJM

— Rachel Maddow MSNBC (@maddow) October 30, 2020

Never mind that a two-year probe conducted by Robert Mueller proved Democrats’ ‘Russian collusion’ The conspiracy theory True but not true. Never mind that the recent release of Trump’s tax returns also showed it True but not true.

Even the Washington Post is saying it’s not true!

In 2019, Mueller was found empty handed. Disappointed Democrats maintained that Russia used bots and trolls on social media to help Trump win. But, Washington Post’s Tim Starks reported Monday, emphasis added “Russian influence operations on Twitter in the 2016 presidential election reached relatively few users, most of whom were highly partisan Republicans, and the Russian accounts had no measurable impact in changing minds or influencing voter behavior, according to a study out this morning.”

.@SpeakerPelosi I agree with:

To repair the damage done to our national security, Congress must establish an investigative body similar to the 9/11 Commission to investigate Trump’s connections to Putin. This will allow us to prevent another puppet from taking over the presidency. pic.twitter.com/yR7LQmXm5Z

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) January 18, 2021

“The study, which the New York University Center for Social Media and Politics helmed, explores the limits of what Russian disinformation and misinformation was able to achieve on one major social media platform in the 2016 elections,” The Post noted.

The story continues. “’My personal sense coming out of this is that this got way overhyped,’ Josh Tucker, one of the report’s authors who is also the co-director of the New York University center, told me about the meaningfulness of the Russian tweets.”

The story contains many details and statistics, but the grand takeaway and WaPo’s headline—“Russian trolls on Twitter had little influence on 2016 voters”—tell us fairly conclusively that at least on Twitter, the minimal amount of interference Russia committed also had minimal influence on the election.

John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Amy Klobuchar visited Ukraine after the 2016 election and declared that Russia had attacked the USA through hacking of the election.

The election wasn’t hacked but they didn’t care. pic.twitter.com/wncJEYJlDX

— Maze (@mazemoore) January 9, 2023

So, at this point, saying Russia hacked or stole the 2016 election through Twitter bots is about as silly as saying your Uncle Fred and his Trump-loving bar buddies’ tweets stole the election.

Do I believe this, and all other evidence that Russia didn’t steal the 2016 election, will convince Democrats to reconsider their favorite conspiracy theory? As many Republicans who believed Barack Obama was born in Kenya will ever give up trying to find his true birthplace, “real” Certificate of birth

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