On May 2, Dartmouth’s Neukom Institute for Computational Science and Russian department hosted researcher and author Nina Jankowicz for an event entitled “How to (Really) Lose the Disinformation War.” Today, perhaps, most would not recognize her name, but at this time last year Jankowicz was at the center of a national media frenzy.
In April 2022, she was appointed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) as the executive director of the agency’s first “disinformation governance board.” In an environment in which political actors and social media entities have weaponized the term ‘disinformation’ to discredit and censor legitimate viewpoints, the announcement was met with significant scrutiny from conservatives. While the board’s official purpose was to “coordinate countering misinformation related to homeland security,” past partisan statements from Jankowicz raised concerns about her ability to assume an objective position relative to freedom of expression. After a three-week public relations fiasco, in which the board was likened to a “Ministry of Truth,” the DHS disbanded it. Consequently, Jankowicz was to be found in Oopik Auditorium, rather than Washington D.C., last Tuesday.
In her lecture, Jankowicz described various disinformation episodes and corresponding lessons. The first story she recounted consisted of an unlikely partnership: The Russian government-aligned Internet Research Agency (IRA), which engages in online influence operations, and a Washington D.C.-based left-wing advocacy group. The latter planned a theatrical flash mob to “resist the rule of [President] Trump” on July 4, 2017; unsealed records indicate that the former advertised the event to draw high attendance. According to Jankowicz, the advocacy group’s leader corresponded with a Facebook account that offered to assist in promotion and erroneously believed that the profile was based in New York. The story reflects how Russia’s efforts do not target a specific political perspective but generally amplify voices to pit Americans against each other.
The second story was about Russian disinformation in the Czech Republic and failed efforts to credibly address the threat. Jankowicz spoke of how Russian accounts published misleading information during the EU migration crisis to fuel animus towards Muslims and the incumbent government over perceived inaction. To debunk false information, the Czech government established the “Centre Against Terrorism and Hybrid Threats.” However, according to Jankowicz, the Centre’s confusing title and vague mandate compromised its effectiveness. Consequently, it was discredited by many—including the country’s president—who labeled it a vehicle for censorship. Jankowicz used this story to segue into her personal one at the DHS.
According to Jankowicz, the debacle following her appointment was the product of a vigorous disinformation campaign and left profound personal consequences. She said that the disinformation governance board would have operated within the DHS’s existing disinformation apparatus and lacked authority over speech issues. She also claimed that “if the Board [had] restricted speech, [she] would not have taken the job.” Jankowicz proceeded to read vile threats she and her family received about her role. During that period, Jankowicz was unable to respond to criticisms publicly due to the communications policy at the DHS. Ultimately, she characterized the uproar over the board as an effort to “run her out of public life.”
Jankowicz’s speech itself was largely uncontroversial. The solutions she presented to quell disinformation related broadly to empowering civil society and prioritizing individual accountability. No sane person would condone the abusive remarks she received, and most rational people would agree that there is a compelling interest to limit foreign interference in domestic affairs.
However, from my perspective, the event was unsatisfying. It was only uncontroversial because Jankowicz chose not to address the more polarizing issues relevant to her background and the disinformation field.
First, in recounting the backlash to her appointment, Jankowicz spoke only of the trolls. She did not address the legitimate concerns that her staunch partisan background would undermine her ability to serve objectively on a board concerning information flows. For example, in 2016, she shared an article on Twitter promoting the now-discredited claim that President Trump was connected to a Kremlin-linked bank—part of the ‘Russiagate’ investigation. Prior to the 2020 election, she insinuated that the content discovered on the now-verified Hunter Biden laptop—including dubious foreign business ventures and prolific drug abuse-—-was the result of a Russian disinformation operation. It is hardly unjust to have concerns when an anti-disinformation position is held by an individual with a history of endorsing partisan falsehoods. Hence, I asked Jankowicz during the question-and-answer period whether she regretted her past remarks. She expressed that she did not regret these statements and said that fears by the political right were unfounded, as the Hatch Act restricts federal employees from involvement in political activity. She concluded the response by encouraging the audience to “express [their] political opinions and then go serve in government.”
Jankowicz also did not address the sensitive relationship between anti-disinformation strategies and freedom of expression. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Big Tech platforms such as Twitter and Facebook exercised “anti-disinformation” policies to censor accounts that disputed official government narratives. Offending topics included suggestions that COVID potentially originated in a lab, that natural immunity confers strong protection against the virus, and that the vaccine does not stop virus transmission. Today, we know that these claims are true, but the mass de-platforming of individuals who espoused these positions provides a real-world example of powerful institutions deploying anti-disinformation strategies to malign legitimate information.
Providing this example as context, I asked Jankowicz how to grapple with concerns that anti-disinformation efforts can be abused as a tool of censorship. She replied that COVID information flows presented a “difficult situation” and that she understands concerns of “unelected people influencing how [the] public square functions.” She added that “what we need is more regulation [rather than] pushback against people trying their best in a difficult environment.”
It is unclear what such regulation would look like. However, in past remarks on MSNBC, Jankowicz lamented Facebook’s “allowance of free-speech fairy dust to reign over the platform” and expressed support for regulation to restrict content on “climate denial or other ‘hateful’ topics.” To many, government intervention to ban posts that question the scientific consensus on climate change (intervention that Nina Jankowicz appears to support) would be gross overreach and create a slippery slope. Would it similarly be appropriate for a conservative administration to restrict social media posts that claim there are more than two genders on scientific grounds? Clearly no: even the woke are entitled to express their opinions. By diving deeper—beyond the brazen examples of foreign political interference that Jankowicz cited in her speech—it becomes clear that disinformation control cannot be divorced from individual bias. And arriving at this conclusion is where the ‘disinformation expert’ charade collapses.
Ultimately, Nina Jankowicz is just one of many in the ‘anti-disinformation’ industry who want to have their cake and eat it too. They have no qualms about embracing and amplifying left-wing partisan positions from a megaphone, yet they expect to be perceived as credible, balanced voices on overseeing the validity of contentious information. Luckily, most Americans don’t buy this repackaged manifestation of liberal elitism. Regardless of politics, always be skeptical of anyone who claims to be an arbiter of reality.
When ever they say “Russia ” is the issue..look at China.