Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S.This news analysis was originally distributed in Votebeat’s free weekly newsletter. Sign up to get future editions, including the latest reporting from Votebeat bureaus and curated news from other publications, delivered to your inbox every Saturday.The Russians are at it again.The U.S. Justice Department announced this week that it has indicted two Russian employees of state-owned broadcaster RT and seized control of web domains in a wide-ranging effort to push back on Russian disinformation related to the U.S. presidential election.It is a grim reminder, with fewer than 60 days to Election Day, that foreign interests are still trying to influence the outcome. In Russia’s case, that means amplifying America’s divisions in service of its own interests, especially around the war in Ukraine — tactics that echo its strategy in 2016.The Russian operation is an example of “more diverse and more aggressive foreign malign influence efforts that we were seeing in this election cycle,” said U.S. Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, speaking at an event on covering the 2024 election sponsored by the Aspen Institute in Washington, the day the Justice Department action became public.The efforts, she said, “involve more actors from more countries than we have ever seen before, operating in a more polarized world than we have ever seen before, all fueled by more technology and accelerated by technology, like AI.”Federal officials have been warning of foreign interference — from Russia, from China, from Iran — for some time.“The American public should know that content that they read online — especially on social media — could be foreign propaganda, even if it appears to be coming from fellow Americans or originating in the United States,” an official from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told reporters back in July, according to the Associated Press.Sure enough, according to the indictment announced this week, multiple popular American right-wing social media personalities were duped into spreading misinformation generated by a Russian propaganda operation. They were paid to produce pro-Russian video content for social media that racked up millions of views.Propaganda, obviously, is more effective when it’s filtered through American sources trusted by a particular audience.Among the well-known commentators involved in the propaganda campaign were Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, and Benny Johnson. The Justice Department is not alleging that any of these influencers knowingly participated. Rather, it says, they were given false information about the source of the funding that paid for their work. It accuses the two Russian state media company employees of sending nearly $10 million to a company based in Tennessee.Though the Justice Department does not name the company in the indictment, it has been widely reported to be Tenet Media, a company run by conservative commentator Lauren Chen. Tenet’s six main influencers have more than 7 million followers combined on both YouTube and X.The indictment indicates that one unidentified influencer was paid a $400,000 monthly fee, along with a $100,000 signing bonus and additional performance bonuses. This is likely Rubin.Pool, who has more than 2 million followers on X and was apparently being paid $100,000 per podcast episode by Tenet, posted after the release of the indictment: “Should these allegations prove true, I as well as the other personalities and commentators were deceived and are victims.”He also posted: “Putin is a scumbag, Russia sucks donkey balls.”YouTube has already “terminated” four YouTube accounts associated with Chen. Blaze Media, a conservative media company, has fired Chen as a result of the allegations and appears to have scrubbed the site of her commentary on even innocuous topics.The two Russian media employees, Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva, are charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act.At the Aspen Institute gathering, experts pointed out what should be clear to all Americans by now: that foreign interests aren’t done trying to sow chaos and erode Americans’ faith in their own democracy.Americans must figure out how to deal with this. While the indictment is stunning in its timing and its breadth, it is also a reminder that voters need to be on guard and skeptical — because more attempts are coming.Votebeat Managing Editor Carrie Levine contributed.Jessica Huseman is Votebeat’s editorial director and is based in Dallas. Contact Jessica at jhuseman@votebeat.org.First published by Votebeat.