Opinion: How Russia Finds the Cracks in American Society – and Widens Them

Laura Loomer, the combative pro-Trump activist and online influencer with nearly two million followers, offers a remarkable case study in how a Russian information operation works. The remarkable part of the story is, she has publicly described the process from the inside.

For years, Loomer argued that Ukraine did not deserve American support. On her program, she described aid as money extracted from “unwilling US taxpayers.” She called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky an “emerging dictator” who was “in some ways even worse than Vladimir Putin.”

Then, during a July 2026 visit to Kyiv, Loomer publicly disavowed what she had previously been saying about Ukraine. After meeting with President Zelensky, and after learning from the members of the Ukrainian National Police who monitor the Russian information warfare efforts, that much of her anti-Ukraine beliefs were the product of Russian disinformation, she made a remarkable admission: “I was bamboozled by Russian propaganda.”

Among the falsehoods Loomer says she had accepted were that Ukraine was a country “full of Nazis” and that Ukraine, rather than Russia, had started the war. She had also absorbed the broader Kremlin portrayal of Ukraine as an illegitimate, corrupt aggressor and Russia as the party reacting to Western and Ukrainian aggression.

Here’s what she said happened. After the 2020 election, she had been deplatformed from major social media outlets, abruptly cutting her off from millions of followers. She had lost the arena in which she had built her career, her community, her public voice – and, to a significant degree, her identity.

At this just this time, people from RT, (formerly Russia Today) came to her and said in effect, We are fighting the kind of censorship you’ve experienced. We’re partners in fighting for freedom! We understand what you’ve been through!

A lot of what happened to her next is explained by the old saying, “A friend in need is a friend indeed.” She became receptive to the arguments from her new “friends.”

Thomas Kent, author of the new “The Propaganda Manual of the Ukraine War” and former president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, says Russia is skilled at exploiting disenchanted Americans. Surely Loomer must at this point have been a tempting target for a Russian information operation.

Kent points out that Russians identify divisions that are useful to them. The division Americans feel over opposition to aid for Ukraine is highly useful to the Russian side.

As Kent explains it, an American may oppose that aid for reasons having nothing to do with feeling favorable towards Russia. Some believe the United States should spend more money at home. Some remember Iraq and Afghanistan and fear that a limited commitment will grow into an unlimited one. Others believe Europe should carry more of the burden or that Ukraine is too distant from core American interests.

Those views would exist if Russian propaganda vanished tomorrow. However, increasing the number of Americans who hold these views is beneficial to Russia. In the case of Laura Loomer, the goal of the Russian operators was first to expose her to these views and then to do everything in their arsenal to make sure that her views reached the widest possible audience.

Why Loomer was such a target

Set aside Loomer’s politics for a moment and consider her psychological circumstances in 2020. She had been publicly rejected by powerful institutions in her own country. Then Russian media figures appeared when she was most susceptible.

Russians did not have to invent Loomer’s anger and distress. They only had to recognize it, affirm it, make her feel valued and important, and then direct her toward information that served Russian interests. And she was ideal because the most persuasive messenger to an American audience is likely to be another American.

An information operation does not have to convert most Americans. In a close election, a percentage point may matter. In a congressional debate, it may be enough to make consensus impossible. In a polarized society, it may be enough to persuade each side that the other is not merely mistaken but treacherous.

The intended product is often not belief.

It is paralysis.

A nation that cannot agree on what is happening will struggle to decide what to do about it. A nation whose citizens regard one another as adversaries will have less attention, money and political will available to deal with an adversary abroad. If Russia can deepen our divisions and weaken the trust that makes collective action possible, for them that may be victory enough.

What makes Laura Loomer’s story so valuable is that she eventually recognized what had happened to her – and had the courage to say so publicly. By acknowledging how being deplatformed and censored made her target for a malign influence operation, she has given us something rarer than a cautionary tale: she has given us a view from inside the machinery. She deserves immense credit for that honesty, and for making the lesson visible to the rest of us.