Texty.org.ua report a smear campaign supported by Musk, Shariy

Photo by Texty.org.ua on Facebook

Texty.org.ua reports a new smear campaign consisting of manipulation and slander on X, supported by the social media platform's owner Elon Musk and Russian propagandist Anatoliy Shariy. The media outlet posted a statement about this on their website on March 4.

The media outlet notes that, like last summer, there are grounds to believe that the attack was coordinated and is part of a campaign targeting Ukraine.

According to the media outlet, on March 1, American activist Laura Loomer and Romanian blogger Iosephine Pascal spread false information about Texty.org.ua.

Laura Loomer, who is close to the Trumpist Republicans, posted a reminder that "Ukraine is not our ally because they made hit lists of American citizens, including me." The post referred to the media outlet's project "Roller Coaster. From Trumpists to Communists. The forces in the U.S. impeding aid to Ukraine and how they do it", released in June 2024, in which the journalists explored how the arguments of those opposing continued Ukraine aid echo the narratives of Russian propaganda.

A few hours later, Iosephine Pascal, a supporter of the pro-Russian Romanian politician Kelin Georgescu, accused the Texty team of interfering in Romania's internal affairs, namely, of calling for the cancellation of elections in her country. She cited four of the media outlet's reports as evidence: two news stories about the presidential race in Romania and two analytical articles. She called Texty.org.ua a Ukrainian state group that also received USAID funding.

The Romanian blogger also mentioned the "hit lists" of American conservative figures at almost the same time as her American colleague.

Her post was shared 11 minutes later by Mario Nawfal, an American X user with two million followers who calls himself an investor in cryptocurrencies. X owner Elon Musk, a fan and super-sharer of Mario Nawfal, shared the post from him.

In this way, the defamatory post yielded several thousand shares.

On the same day, an identical message about Texty.org.ua was posted by a well-known Russian propagandist Anatoliy Shariy.

Texty.org.ua state that they are an independent media outlet that employs 12 people.

"We are a non-governmental organization unaffiliated with the state. We often criticize the Ukrainian government and have not received direct funding from USAID," the team says.

The journalists add that they did not call for the annulment of the Romanian election results. One of their articles analyzed the presidential race and contained no mentions of Georgescu. In the other article, the media outlet reported on Georgescu gaining votes through a TikTok campaign and on possible Russian involvement in it.

In one of the publications mentioned by the Romanian blogger, we analyzed the presidential race, and we did not mention Gorgescu. On the other, we talked about how Bohdan Gheorghiu gained votes through the TikTok campaign and how Russia could be involved. We did not call for the election results to be canceled.

Regarding the hit list accusations by Americans, the media outlet says that back during the previous wave of attacks on Texty.org.ua, immediately following the release of their study, they said in a statement: "This data was collected and published only to demonstrate the evidence base for the theses presented in the article. The article is not an accusation but a study of the political and media context influencing the government's decision to continue supporting Ukraine in the Russian-Ukrainian war."

In response to the coordinated spread of false accusations of calls for violence, Texty.org.ua emphasizes that they are an independent outlet and that studying Russian propaganda and disinformation in Ukraine and beyond is one of their lines of work.

"That is why we have probably become the target of another information attack, which is part of a large-scale campaign against Ukraine and the Ukrainian government. The Texty.org.ua team has never called for violent actions or tried to interfere in political processes in other countries. Instead, it has focused on data analysis and research of information influence algorithms," the team's statement reads.