A group of four US citizens and three Russian nationals have been charged in connection with an investigation into a foreign influence campaign.

The Justice Department (DOJ) said in a release on Tuesday that a federal grand jury issued a superseding indictment against the individuals, alleging they were working on behalf of the Russian government and with the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the country’s main security and intelligence force, to influence US politics over multiple years.

The indictment adds to a case the DOJ has been pursuing against Aleksandr Viktorovich Ionov, the founder and president of a Moscow-based organization called the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia. He was charged in July with conspiring to have US citizens act as agents on behalf of the Russian government.

Officials alliance Ionov used his organization to conduct the foreign influence campaign with supervision from FSB officers. The superseding indictment names Aleksey Borisovich Sukhodolov and Yegor Sergeyevich Popov as FSB officers who were responsible for directing the campaign.

The release states that the three Russian defendants “recruited, funded and directed” political groups in the United States to act illegally as unregistered agents of Moscow and spread pro-Russian propaganda.

“Russia’s foreign intelligence service appears to have weaponized our First Amendment rights — freedoms Russia denies its own citizens — to divide Americans and interfere in elections in the United States,” Assistant Attorney General for the DOJ’s National Security Division Matthew Olsen said.

closed

Thank you for signing up!

Subscribe to more newsletters here

The latest in politics and policy. Direct to your inbox. Sign up for the Defense and National Security newsletter

The release alleges Ionov was engaged in the campaign from at least November 2014 to July 2022. He allegedly recruited members from three political groups in Florida, Georgia and California to participate in