Two Rumors, One Pipeline

Last Saturday the story was a false rumor that James Talarico had been in Ohio, promoted by Republicans and traced partly to an account with a history of posting about Nazi Germany. Today the Times reports that a covert Russian group is pushing baseless claims about Talarico too, and that intelligence officials see foreign influence operations stepping up, mostly aimed at Democrats. I only have the summary, so I don’t know whether the two campaigns touched each other.

I suspect it barely matters, and that’s the interesting part. A rumor has no passport. If an American account and a Russian one say roughly the same thing, the voter sees one claim and the investigator sees a tangle. Attribution used to be the job of a few federal offices that could say “this one is foreign” with some authority. Politico noted this week that the federal-state partnership on election security is fractured, and the Washington Post reported that officials are privately advising states who fear Trump meddling. That’s a lot of private advice for a job that used to be done in public.

The incentives are tidy in a way I don’t love. Foreign operators pick the race where a small shift could decide Senate control, and Texas is one of them. Domestic amplifiers get free distribution. The referee who would label the origin is either understaffed or a participant, depending on who you ask.

I’m curious what states are doing with the advice. A county clerk with a press release is a thin defense against a coordinated rumor, but she may be the only one still holding a whistle.