The Trump administration has brought back MAGA shill Lauren Chen, whose company Tenet Media was exposed by feds in 2024 as being bankrolled by Kremlin-funded RT to pay influencers like Tim Pool, Benny Johnson, and Dave Rubin millions of dollars to spread pro-Putin propaganda.
Chen and her husband Liam Donovan, Canadian nationals, lost their visas under the Biden administration and went dark on social media when YouTube banned their channel. In September 2024, the SDNY targeted the Russian funders who directed $10 million to the Tenet Media couple.
According to court records, the federal case against Tenet’s funders is still open. But with the Russian operators who allegedly facilitated the money-laundering scheme still at large, the investigation hasn’t gone anywhere in the year since the indictments were filed.
The right-wing commentators who posted on Tenet have maintained their innocence about the nature of the operation, with Johnson, Rubin, and Pool all claiming that they were “victims” of Chen’s company—duped by the Russian government into taking tens of thousands of dollars for making a single YouTube video.
Instead of repercussions, those influencers have a larger footprint of influence today with MAGA influencers at the forefront of the pro-Trump propaganda campaign.