So it looks like the Konstantin Rykov story has finally begun to get some major traction.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

Preface: The purpose of this post is not to toot my own horn....all of this information is public knowledge and the people reporting on it now could have gathered it from any number of sources. However, I will say it does feel damn good to see this story beginning to see the light of day for everyone to see, and we can only hope more sources look into it and pick it up if it seems to be bonafide.


Back in July, I stumbled across the Facebook page of Konstantin Rykov, a former member of the Russian Duma for Putin's United Russia party and an individual who has been nicknamed "Putin's Trollmaster" for his online activity to the benefit of the Russian government. Rykov had received some press for throwing celebratory parties for Russian Trump supporters on both Election Day and Inauguration Day. Curious, I looked into his postings around the time of Trump's election.

What I found absolutely floored me. I had to do a double take.

On November 12, 2016, just days after the election, Rykov posted what could only be described as a boastful confession, where he claimed he had been working to get Trump elected as President since 2012 (after he claims Trump supposedly sent him a picture on Election Day 2012, a picture that he did manage to post to his Instagram feed). Rykov claims he started a campaign where he used Cambridge Analytica and Wikileaks to target potential voters in the US and bombard them with pro-Trump information. And in fact, he did launch a Russian pro-Trump website in the summer of 2015 just weeks after Trump officially announced his candidacy.

Here's what I posted to DU right after I found Rykov's posts:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029322103

Curious, I continued to look into some of Rykov's associates, and found some interesting material on a Russian oligarch named Artem Klyushin, who had partied with Trump during the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow. Here are my posts on those:


https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029326152

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029340331

My postings received some attention internally at DU, but not a whole lot further seemed to come about it beyond here. I did manage to briefly communicate with a very reputable and knowledgeable individual on the matter, but the story was pretty much dormant for the next four months.

However, over the past week, Rykov's story has seemingly exploded.

Seth Abramson--who has been posting some great work about Trump's Russian connections on Twitter (albeit not the best format for long postings, but I'll give him a pass)--has been on the Trump-Rykov-Klyushin story like white on rice lately. He even gives DU a shout out here:

Link to tweet

In turn, the Rykov story has been reported on by several online publications:

https://medium.com/@ScottMStedman/kremlin-propagandist-boasted-of-his-hacking-efforts-strongly-implied-colluding-with-trump-team-in-a905104965a1

https://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/11/24/a-trumprussia-confession-in-plain-sight/

Several other Twitter accounts have also reported on the story and tweets featuring both Rykov and Trump's names have skyrocketed over the holiday weekend.

And while Rykov's alleged confession isn't explicitly mentioned, Rykov's name is discussed in a recent story from The Atlantic regarding Russian money in internet technology.

It may only be a matter of time before some of the major networks and newspapers start taking a deeper look into Konstantin Rykov and associates.

[writes3000]

1. Thats great work! Congratulations on this. Rykovs boldness about this is chilling.

I hope Mueller’s team is all over this.

Again, great job!

[SergeStorms]

51. All well and good,

but can any of this be connected to the Trump campaign in any way? Had anyone from the Trump campaign been contacted about this prior to the election, and did they respond in any way?

I think it's general knowledge that the Russians interfered with the 2016 election (well, maybe not to Trump). What we (and more importantly Mueller) need is a connection to prove collusion with the Russians.

That will nail down the lid on Trump's political coffin. That is what America needs to hope for.

[brush]

2. Good work.

[dalton99a]

3. Great post on this guy

Thanks!

[Phoenix61]

4. Great job digging for info

How cool it is gaining traction.

[malaise]

5. This collection deserves 500 recs

Here's one

[NoMoreRepugs]

6. Great post ... let's hope this has been

detected by the Mueller team.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

7. I'm sure Mueller, and probably the CIA, are far more knowledgeable on Rykov than any of us.

And he's either been determined to be a full-of-shit blowhard or someone who was actually in the thick of things and wasn't ashamed to flaunt it.

What we see right now is like finding two connected pieces in a 10,000 piece jigsaw puzzle.

[magicarpet]

15. Like finding a needle in the hay stack.....

The more you look the more you find, this is what it will take to shut down the treasonous tr-dump crime syndicate.

[Enoki33]

8. Thanks. This level of info is one of the reasons why l come here.

[Botany]

9. Anybody have Robert Mueller's email address?

n/t

[dalton99a]

12. Try

https://www.justice.gov/sco

Robert S. Mueller III
Special Counsel

Department of Justice
Special Counsel’s Office
950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Room B-103
Washington, D.C. 20530

[e-mail]

[Botany]

13. thanx

n/t

[ATL Ebony]

36. sent him a twitter message linking to Tommy_Carcetti's post, maybe he read it, maybe he ignored it

But hopefully he or someone on the team takes a look if they aren't already familiar with Konstantin Rykov's involvement.

[certainot]

45. i hope he's linking the russians to limbaugh and talk radio

according to sam nunberg he listened to 1000s of hours of talk radio in 2014 and reported to trump. (new york mag 4/3/16 gabriel sherman)

trump is a city boy - who told him speaking talk radio was how to win the primaries? he is the talk radio president.

i'll bet the russians have been using talk radio since at least 2008 elections. those 1500 coordinated radio stations making excuses for trump and deflecting the russia investigation to the obama/clinton deep state may be them woking for the GOP, but limbaugh and the idiots who follow him have been anti-establishment sing the 2008 elections.

cambridge analytic and wikileaks are small parts of this compared with talk radio

best thing to come out of this won't be trump in jail - it will be limbaugh and a few other talk radio gods like hannity being caught taking laundered money from russians for 8 or 10 years.

[PatSeg]

10. K&R

[Maven]

11. You should toot your own horn!

Abramson cited your original post in his tweetstorm about this. Great work!!!

[ATL Ebony]

37. K&R +1000, kudos Carcetti

[dchill]

14. K&R.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

16. A couple of things I learned now from Abramson and Co. that I didn't realize back then.

1. Alferova Yulya--who was ever present at Trump's side during the entire 2013 Miss Universe event--was Artem Klyushin's wife at the time.

2. In 2014--over a year before Trump officially announced and even before he officially had begun to signal his interest in running--Yulya was constantly re-tweeting Trump's Pro-Russian and anti-Obama tweets, and even threw this in for good measure:

Link to tweet

This was a day after her husband had this to say:

Link to tweet

/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.democraticunderground.com%2F10029340331

3. Artem Kluyshin may have been physically present at Rykov's Election Night bash in Russia. (See 7:25 in the video...Rykov is the one with the beard and the hoodie over the Trump-Pence shirt, and people believe the individual at the far left might be Klyushin.)

4. Klyushin may have attended a Trump speech in Iowa in 2015.

[renate]

30. that is too funny: "America needs ambitious leader!"

As though we're supposed to believe that Russia actually wants a strong leader for America instead of a puppet.

[certainot]

46. trump studied talk radio in 2014, according to sam nunberg, who

listened to 1000s of hours of talk raido and reported to trump. new york magazine/gabriel sherman/ 4/3/16 - see comment above....

if they were planning to run him back then it makes sense.

i suspect they told him to do that because while dems ignore it and repubs take it for granted russians would recognize a successful propaganda/psyops operation undemining democracy under americans' noses.

and what better way to coordinate everything - just figure out how to feed limbaugh - maybe mueller will make those connections and catch limbaugh with free lance laundered money

[Pachamama]

54. This gave me goosebumps....

Incredible....

None of this is coincidence....

[BlancheSplanchnik]

17. How cool! Real investigative work right here!

🥇👍🏾👏🏻🤟🏾

[Achilleaze]

18. k and r

[N_E_1 for Tennis]

19. Great work

This is so interesting

[orangecrush]

20. K&R

Keep up the good work!

[niyad]

21. k and r and bookmarking. the people here on du are the most amazing, aware, on-the-ball

people I have ever had the pleasure of associating with, and I give thanks every single day for all of you.

[gademocrat7]

22. K&R!

[erronis]

23. " It may only be a matter of time before some of the major networks and newspapers start taking..."

A deeper look into Konstantin Rykov and associates."

Good luck with that. The Media wants your eyeballs and contents of your bank accounts. They aren't really interested in giving you news. Just mind-numbing entertainment.

The ones that aren't paid-for mouthpieces of Trump or the Koch's are being bought out.

And just to be sure, the wires and waves that carry the information are being closed down by the same powers.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

24. I would hope that maybe Rachel Maddow take a look into at least.

Assuming she feels comfortable about what she can report as true-as-fact as well as verifiable authentic.

[Eliot Rosewater]

27. I remember, I think, seeing you do this info here before, right?

I remember thinking then how nice it would be if the media would look at this, Mueller etc.

Real proud to know you! EXCELLENT work!

(yeah, duh, you linked to your previous stuff, so I was NOT imagining it)

[Tommy_Carcetti]

31. Yep, it's been a pet project of mine since July.

Thanks!

[blaze]

25. Did you see this post?

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=9890073

[Eliot Rosewater]

26. We noticed that also.

Real deep throat stuff.

Could be real, too.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

28. I missed that but I know Stedman wrote the Medium piece that Abramson mentioned.

I wonder if he could verify anything Truthfinder was claiming.

Glad DU is performing a valuable service. I just want to make sure that no one is rush and sloppy in reporting this and tries to verify as much as they can before running to print. We don't want anyone Rathered over this.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

29. Olbermann's on it now too!

Link to tweet

[Tommy_Carcetti]

33. Also FWIW, Debra Messing.

Link to tweet

[Squinch]

32. Kick! Great job!

[lagomorph777]

34. Congratulations on getting the ball rolling!

[malaise]

35. Kick for the evening crowd n/t

[AwakeAtLast]

38. Is that a reason DU was hacked on election day?

It makes one wonder.....

[DAMANgoldberg]

49. I remember that night...

and it didn't make sense to me, especially since Daily Kos has a bigger following. Now it makes sense given all I have seen over the past year here that is finally getting traction.

[Roland99]

39. I remember your post. Thanks for the follow up

[McCamy Taylor]

40. Internet sleuthery and reporting has come so far since W.

K&R

[RandomAccess]

41. It's just amazing what a pivotal role you played here

Congratulations.





And thanks.

[Kajun Gal]

42. Quite interesting, indeed

[Honeycombe8]

43. OMG. Trump formed an alliance with them back in 2012.

And already had a semi-plan with them before then, which was why he sent this guy the pic of him in jet with thumbs up, after Romney's speech.

A super secret weapon: A profile of the perfect Trump voter, so they could appeal directly to him.

OMG.

But Alan Dershowich says Russia interfering in our elections is not illegal? Thought I heard him say that.

[JHan]

44. K&R

[Maraya1969]

47. You have done something very big! Great work and please keep it up!

[calimary]

48. Send it to Rachel!

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/send-it-rachel

[Hekate]

50. Yes, do!

[FakeNoose]

52. Rachel and her staff have strict guidelines

I'm sure they have to check everything out before they can use it on the air. So this Russian guy most likely won't answer any questions from an American news program, even if they could locate him. It sure would make a great story though.

[neohippie]

55. Rachel's staff should be able to verify all Tweets

Thanks for working on this I have been so upset with the normalization of corruption that is being carried out by this administration, they are turning America away from a democracy into a nation that no longer represents justice or has concerns for human rights abuses.

Trump and Tillerson prefer to put profit over everything else.


If they continue to get their way they would no longer pursue money laundering, and would have a separate but not equal system of justice for the poor where Trump declares shoplifting a "big" deal" but crimes like lying under oath, and treason go unpunished.

[steve2470]

53. excellent work, kudos!

You still in Florida ?

[dchill]

56. K&R.

[dchill]

57. K&R.