Senate Intelligence Chairman Criticizes Media ‘Narrative’ About Russia Investigation

Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr is warning Americans and the media against trying to simplify the “narrative” surrounding Russian efforts during the 2016 election to the premise that foreign actors helped elect the president of the United States.

Burr said, "I'm here to tell you, this story does not simplify that easily."

Speaking Wednesday during a hearing into Russian use of social media during the 2016 election, Burr highlighted several media reports that purported to show how Russian-linked Facebook ads targeting Michigan and Wisconsin, two swing states, in the lead up to the election “directly influenced the election’s outcome.”

But Burr said, “What you haven’t heard is that almost five times more ads were targeted at Maryland than Wisconsin.”

Maryland, Burr said, was won handily by Democrats, yet it was targeted by 262 ads, compared to the 55 that targeted Wisconsin, which President Donald Trump won by less than one percent of the vote.

“Thirty-five of the 55 ads targeted at Wisconsin ran prior to the Wisconsin primary, before there was an identified Republican candidate, and moreover, not one of those 55 ads mentioned President Trump by name,” he said.

Divisive ads

Burr called it “troubling” the Russian-backed campaign was able to use American-made social media platforms to “conduct an Info Op. intended to divide our country,” but said “some of the context surrounding” the Russian operation has been absent from media reports.

According to Burr, of the $100,000 reportedly spent by Russians to buy Facebook advertisements, just under $2,000 was spent in Wisconsin, $823 in Michigan and $300 in Pennsylvania, another important state that helped Trump secure the election.

“To believe the narrative, you have to accept that these sophisticated, well-resourced Russian actors studied our processes, assessed what states would be critical to the election’s result, then snuck in and invested all of $300 to execute their plan in Pennsylvania,” he said, adding that five times as many advertisements were targeted at California, which hasn’t voted Republican in a presidential election in nearly 30 years.

Attorneys for Twitter, Facebook and Google were on hand Wednesday for the hearing, a day after a similar hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee, in which they told lawmakers that Russian entities used their platforms to sow discord and disinformation during the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, but downplayed the magnitude of those efforts.

Meager effort by trolls

Twitter's acting general counsel, Sean Edgett, repeated the statement he gave Tuesday, in which he told lawmakers the company has studied all tweets posted from Sept. 1 to Nov. 15, 2016.

That study, Edgett said, found that election-related content posted by automated Russian troll accounts "was comparatively small." He said the Russian troll accounts made up "around 1/100th of a percent of total Twitter accounts" during the time studied.

"Twitter believes that any activity of that kind, regardless of magnitude, is unacceptable and we agree we must do better to prevent it," he said.

Twitter has taken action against the suspected Russian trolls, suspending 2,752 accounts and implementing new dedicated teams "to enhance the quality of the information our users see," Edgett said.

Facebook, meanwhile, said it would hire more people to vet and, when necessary, remove content, and verify and publish the identities of election advertisers.

"Foreign actors used fake accounts to place ads in Facebook and Instagram that reached millions of Americans over a two-year period," Facebook General Counsel Colin Stretch said, testifying before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee. "Many of these ads and posts are inflammatory. Some are downright offensive."

Stretch, on Wednesday, told lawmakers the Russian Facebook posts were seen by 150 million Americans, up from the 126 million estimate released by Facebook earlier this week.

More than one candidate

When asked by Senator Jim Risch, all three lawyers agreed that the campaign was “much broader” than the 2016 election and aimed at creating divisiveness rather than promoting one candidate.

“The large majority of the material we saw was on the socially divisive side, rather than direct electoral advocacy,” Kent Walker, Google’s general counsel, said.

Bipartisan legislation has been introduced in the Senate requiring some of the very steps technology giants say they are implementing on their own.

"It shouldn't be news to anyone that Russia interfered in the election," said California Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein. "What is really staggering and hard to fully comprehend is how easily and successfully they turned modern technologies to their advantage."

The social media attorneys said Russian trolling campaigns consistently sought to rile up Americans, first in a way damaging to Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. After the election, they said, Russian efforts appeared aimed at sowing doubts about the legitimacy of Republican Donald Trump's victory at the polls.

Each of the lawyers told lawmakers investigations into Russian use of their platforms during the election are still ongoing and that they do not know the full scope of the Russian campaign.

The social media lawyers are also to meet with the House Intelligence Committee for a similar hearing on Russian election meddling.

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NY Terror Suspect Questioned About Motive

Authorities in New York have started questioning the driver of a rented pickup truck who mowed down people on a busy bike path Tuesday, attempting to learn his motive for the deadliest terrorist incident in the city since the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Officials linked the suspect, Sayfullo Saipov, a 29-year-old Uzbek immigrant who came to the United States in 2010, to social media accounts that contain Islamic State-related material. News reports said that a note was found at the scene of the attack in which he claimed allegiance to the jihadist group. IS has not officially claimed responsibility.

Saipov was shot in the abdomen by a New York policeman in the lower Manhattan area of the city, but survived. Authorities questioned him before he underwent surgery Tuesday evening.

At least eight people were killed and 11 others injured in the attack, described by New York Mayor Bill de Blasio as "a particularly cowardly act of terror aimed at innocent civilians."

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo told CNN, "He's a depraved coward is what he is, and he was associated with ISIS, and he was radicalized domestically."

Trump reacts

U.S. President Donald Trump Tuesday night ordered the country's Homeland Security agency "to step up our already Extreme Vetting Program," about immigration into the U.S. "Being politically correct is fine, but not for this!"

On Wednesday, Trump, in a Twitter remark, blamed Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer of New York for allowing "the terrorist" into the U.S., as part of "what is called the 'Diversity Visa Lottery Program,' a Chuck Schumer beauty. I want merit based."

Schumer accused Trump of "politicizing and dividing America, which he always seems to do at times of national tragedy." Schumer said he has "always believed and continue to believe that immigration is good for America."

The immigration lottery was part of 1990 U.S. legislation that Schumer, then a member of the House of Representatives, sponsored along with 25 other Democrats and six Republicans.

Among those killed were five Argentine nationals who were in New York to celebrate the 30th anniversary of their high school graduation, as well as a Belgian.

Vehicular attacks

Tuesday's incident, involving a rented Home Depot truck, was similar to terrorist vehicle attacks that have been carried out in other Western countries in recent years. New America, a nonpartisan research center, says 15 vehicular attacks have been carried out since 2014, killing more than 140 people.

New York Police Commissioner James O’Neill said around 3:05 p.m. local time Tuesday, the truck entered the bike path, striking riders and pedestrians. The truck also struck a school bus, injuring two adults and two children. The driver then "exited the vehicle brandishing two handguns,” O’Neill said, with the policeman ending the incident by shooting Saipov. A paintball gun and a pellet gun were later found at the scene.

Greg Barton, a professor of global Islamic politics at Deakin University in Australia, said it seems as if the attacker was inspired by IS.

"Islamic State doesn’t claim attacks when the attacker is held in custody and so they probably won’t claim this one," Barton told VOA. "But there’s no question that we’ve seen many attempted attacks in New York and there will be more attempts in the future."

Uzbek reaction

Uzbekistan's president, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, said Wednesday the attack was ruthless and cruel, and that his government stood ready to use all means to assist in the investigation.

"We express our feelings of full solidarity to the people of the United States of America," Mirziyoyev said in a statement posted on the Uzbekistan Foreign Ministry website.

"We strongly condemn the terror truck attack on the innocent civilians in New York City. Our deepest sympathy and condolences to the families who lost their loved ones," said the Turkistanian American Association of New York and New Jersey, on behalf of the Uzbek community, in a statement sent by email to the Voice of America.

The Cato Institute told VOA only about 40,000 Uzbeks have entered the United States as migrants in the last 20 years, and that of those, only 2 percent arrived as refugees.

Witness accounts

For some witnesses, the chaos was reminiscent of images of deadly attacks from across Europe.

"It always seems really distant but then when it’s right next to you, obviously it’s really shocking and disturbing, and you don’t want it to happen to anybody," said Elizabeth Chernobelsky, who witnessed the crime scene.

Others were left in disbelief. College student Jake Saunders, who barely missed a train at a crucial moment, told VOA he considers himself lucky.

"If I had made that train, I would be right where the shooting is, right there, because that was my destination," Saunders said.

Police said the driver shouted "Allahu Akbar,'' Arabic for "God is great," when he exited the truck. But when O'Neill was asked whether the suspect shouted the phrase, the commissioner replied, "Yeah. He did make a statement when he exited the vehicle,'' although O'Neill declined to elaborate.

The New York Police Department said it will increase the number of officers throughout the city "out of an abundance of caution."

_{Ramon Taylor in New York and Victor Beattie in Washington DC contributed to this report}

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Trump Tweets NY Attacker Had Diversity Visa

According to a tweet by President Donald Trump Wednesday morning, the Uzbek attacker who killed at people Tuesday night in Manhattan came to the United States on a diversity immigrant visa.

For would-be Americans who don’t have family in the U.S., or an employer to sponsor them, or who aren’t refugees, the diversity visa, also known as the green card lottery, is the only option. It requires a high school degree or a few years of work experience just to qualify.

The State Department noted, however, that visa information is confidential under U.S. law, and that they could not comment on any specific visa application.

Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer played an important role in drawing up legislation for the program in the 1990s. In a statement released Tuesday, he said "I have always believed and continue to believe that immigration is good for America," proposing that Trump focus on the "real solution" of anti-terrorism funding.

Two weeks ago, the U.S. State Department announced that all entries to the lottery this year had been lost and must be resubmitted.

Earlier this year, republican senators proposed scrapping the program altogether.

If the application to the Green Card lottery is valid, your number is chosen and you pass the other requirements for immigrants, you still need the money to get to the U.S. It's a small portion of immigration to the U.S. every year, but larger than other cornerstones of the program, like employment-based immigrant visas.

In Fiscal Year 2015, the U.S. issued 48,097 diversity visas out of 531,463 total immigrant visas.

Natives of all countries qualify except Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, China (mainland-born), Colombia, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, the Philippines, South Korea, the United Kingdom (except Northern Ireland) and its dependent territories, and Vietnam. People born in Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan are eligible.

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On Climate Change, It's Trump vs Markets

Though the Trump administration has taken steps to undo regulations aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions, experts say economic forces are helping to push down U.S. emissions anyway.

U.N. climate negotiators will meet in Bonn, Germany, November 6-17. It will be their first gathering since President Donald Trump announced the United States would withdraw from the Paris climate agreement.

Trump considers efforts to fight climate change a barrier to economic growth. Promising to dominate global energy markets and put struggling U.S. coal miners back to work, he has taken a series of steps to roll back regulations aimed at fighting climate change. They include moving to revoke the Clean Power Plan, former President Barack Obama's primary tool for cutting carbon emissions from power plants.

Energy transition

Losing those regulations won't stop the transition in energy sources that's already underway, according to George Washington University Solar Institute Director Amit Ronen.

"We're still going to meet the goals of the Clean Power Plan in most states, even if it's withdrawn," he said, "just because we're substituting so much natural gas and renewables for coal."

Coal-fired power plants — the most climate-polluting source of electricity — are shutting down across the country. More than 500 closed between 2002 and 2016, and additional plants are slated for closure, according to the Department of Energy. Electric utilities are replacing them with cheaper, cleaner natural gas.

And renewable sources, such as wind and solar, are booming. Prices have plummeted. Renewables are beginning to be cost-competitive with fossil fuels.

Solar tariffs

Though electric utilities are choosing natural gas and renewables over coal, the Trump administration may influence energy markets in other ways.

A case before the International Trade Commission will soon give the president the authority to put tariffs on imported solar panels — and nearly all of them are imported.

The case is billed as an effort to help domestic solar manufacturers. While Trump has not embraced renewable energy, he has said he wants to support U.S. manufacturing jobs.

But solar manufacturing is mostly automated. Far more people work in labor-intensive installation. The Solar Energy Industries Association has opposed measures limiting imports, saying it would cost jobs.

The International Trade Commission recommended tariffs smaller than what the plaintiffs asked for. But Trump gets the last word, expected before mid-January.

Even more severe trade restrictions would not extinguish the renewables industry, however.

"[A tariff] certainly adds cost and might stifle solar development," said Rhodium Group analyst John Larsen. "But the overall clean energy picture doesn't get hit too hard."

That's because many states and cities have policies requiring electric utilities to use renewable energy, Larsen noted. They are stepping up their efforts to cut greenhouse gases, even as the federal government is pulling back. If solar dips, wind may fill in the gap.

Subsidizing coal, nuclear

The proposal that could have a bigger impact on electricity markets comes from the Trump administration's Department of Energy.

With so many coal plants shut down and eight nuclear plants on the brink of closure, Secretary Rick Perry said the reliability of the U.S. electric grid is in jeopardy.

Because coal and nuclear plants provide constant power and have their fuel supplies on-site, Perry suggested paying them more than other sources for their electricity.

The proposal has made unusual allies of the natural gas, solar and wind industries. They wrote joint comments opposing it. And critics across the political spectrum have blasted it.

"This has no intellectual depth. It's unprofessional. It's badly thought out," said finance director Tom Sanzillo of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.

Sanzillo noted that the Department of Energy study on which Perry based his recommendations does not show that grid reliability is threatened. And Perry himself rejected a similar proposal as governor of Texas, where the growing influx of wind power was pushing coal plants out of business.

Not fast enough

Ultimately, experts say, the Trump administration has limited powers to save the coal industry.

While coal's decline is helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, however, experts say they are not falling fast enough to avoid the worst of climate change.

Under the Paris climate agreement, nations agreed to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Former President Obama pledged that the United States would reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 26 percent to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025.

Even the Clean Power Plan, plus other Obama-era regulations, still would have left the United States short of that goal, Larsen said.

"The current U.S. trajectory is not in line with Paris, and the U.S. commitment in Paris wasn't necessarily on track for 2 degrees," he said. "It was a starting point, a down payment.

"Hopefully, other countries step up to the plate to fill in some of that gap. But that's a big if."

The latest report from the U.N. Environment Program says pledged emission cuts worldwide add up to just one-third of what is needed to keep the planet below the 2-degree target.

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NY Mourns, Tightened Security, After Bike Path Rampage

At least eight people were killed Tuesday and more than a dozen others were injured when a man drove a rented truck onto a busy bike path in New York City.

"Based on information we have at this moment, this was an act of terror, and a particularly cowardly act of terror aimed at innocent civilians," New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a news conference.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo called it a "lone wolf'' attack, saying there's no evidence to suggest it was part of a wider plot. The incident took place near the World Trade Center memorial in lower Manhattan.

New York Police Commissioner James O’Neill said around 3:05 p.m., a man driving a rented commercial pickup truck entered the bike path, striking riders and pedestrians. The truck also struck a school bus, injuring two adults and two children.

The man then "exited the vehicle brandishing two handguns,” O’Neill said. A paintball gun and a pellet gun were later found at the scene. He was shot in the abdomen by police and taken into custody.

He underwent surgery and is expected to survive.

Argentina's foreign ministry said five of its citizens were among those killed. A statement identified them as natives of the city of Rosario, who were in New York with a group celebrating their 30th anniversary of graduating school.

Belgian Deputy Prime Minister Didier Reynders said one Belgian was killed in the attack.

Witnesses describe chaos

For some witnesses, the chaos was reminiscent of images of deadly attacks from across Europe.

"It always seems really distant but then when it’s right next to you, obviously it’s really shocking and disturbing, and you don’t want it to happen to anybody," said Elizabeth Chernobelsky, who witnessed the crime scene.

Others were left in disbelief. College student Jake Saunders, who barely missed a train at a crucial moment, told VOA he considers himself lucky.

"If I had made that train, I would be right where the shooting is, right there, because that was my destination," Saunders said.

Uzbek perpetrator

Police said the driver shouted "Allahu Akbar,'' Arabic for "God is great," when he got out of the truck. But when O'Neill was asked whether the suspect shouted the phrase, he replied: "Yeah. He did make a statement when he exited the vehicle,'' though he declined to elaborate.

The New York Police Department said they will increase the number of officers throughout the city "out of an abundance of caution."

Law enforcement officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, told media outlets the suspect was was a 29-year-old immigrant from Uzbekistan named Sayfullo Saipov, who entered the United States in 2010.

Uzbekistan's President Shavkat Mirziyoyev said Wednesday the attack was ruthless and cruel, and that his government stood ready to use all means to assist in the investigation.

"We express our feelings of full solidarity to the people of the United States of America," Mirziyoyev said in a statement posted on the Uzbekistan foreign ministry website.

"We strongly condemn the terror truck attack on the innocent civilians in New York City. Our deepest sympathy and condolences to the families who lost their loved ones," said the Turkistanian American Association of New York and New Jersey, on behalf of the Uzbek community, in a statement sent by email to the Voice of America.

The Cato Institute told VOA only about 40,000 Uzbeks have entered the United States as migrants in the last 20 years, of those only two percent arrived as refugees.

David Bier, a policy analyst at the Washington-based think tank, said he believed this is the first time an Uzbek national has killed anyone on U.S. soil in a terrorist attack.

As of March 2017, three Uzbek nationals had been convicted of terrorism offenses. Ulugbek Kodirov who entered as student visa holder in 2008 and later radicalized on the Internet was convicted of threatening to kill President Obama in 2011. Fazliddin Kurbanov who entered as refugee in 2009 attempted to build bombs for an attack in 2013. Abdurasul Juraboev who immigrated after winning the green card lottery in 2011 was convicted of attempting to join ISIS in Syria in 2015.

Trump vows more extreme vetting

In Washington, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said President Donald Trump had been briefed on the incident and will be continually updated as more details are known. "Our Thoughts and prayers are with all those affected," she said.

Trump later tweeted, "We must not allow ISIS to return, or enter, our country after defeating them in the Middle East and elsewhere. Enough!" Followed by: "I have just ordered Homeland Security to step up our already Extreme Vetting Program. Being politically correct is fine, but not for this!"

Greg Barton, a professor of global Islamic politics at Deakin University in Australia, said it seems as if the attacker was inspired by the Islamic State group.

"Islamic State doesn’t claim attacks when the attacker is held in custody and so they probably won’t claim this one," Barton told VOA. "But there’s no question that we’ve seen many attempted attacks in New York and there will be more attempts in the future.

Barton said stopping radicalization is not hopeless, but will require a multi-step process.

"We need to educate the public, we need to think about putting in physical barriers to limit opportunities for mass carnage with vehicles, we need to be aware of friends and loved ones who might be coming under malign influence, we need to work with society, make people feel more part of society, less alienated and less therefore vulnerable to some cheap approach by a recruiter," he said.

_{Ramon Taylor in New York and Victor Beattie in Washington DC contributed to this report}

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US Social Media Giants Pledge to Combat Foreign Disinformation

U.S. social media companies have acknowledged that Russian entities used their platforms to sow discord and disinformation during and after the 2016 presidential campaign -- and pledged to better combat such abuses in the future. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, representatives from Facebook, Twitter and Google testified before a Senate subcommittee Tuesday as lawmakers ponder legislation to promote transparency on the Internet.

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High-Level Ukrainian, Russian Officials Urge US to Expand Manafort Probe

Ukraine and Russia are both urging the United States to delve deeper into the lobbying activities in Ukraine by one of President Donald Trump's former aides. Paul Manafort, one of Trumps' election campaign managers, has been charged with money laundering and other violations linked to his lobbying for a pro-Russian party in Ukraine, led by former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, who fled to Russia in 2014 following mass anti-government protests in Kyiv. Zlatica Hoke reports.

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