>We've been hearing politicians complain for years that they're losing the youth when it comes to long-standing foreign policy positions,

When Twitter added its location feature and it turned out that political accounts with millions of followers are run out of Pakistan or India you have to be crazy to still deny the scope of foreign influence that is exerted over social media.

You see it with the rise in anti-semitism or Russia's explicit promotion of influencers targeting Western youth. Why on earth would we let our kids be brainwashed by foreign intelligence agencies? There is no reason to assume this is some "hidden agenda", this is as big of a public issue as the mental health of teenagers. The United States used to have media rules that limited foreign ownership in companies with a broadcasting license, and now 14 year olds get their political lessons straight from Moscow, it's ridiculous.

To be fair, "anti-semitism" claims have been 90% bad faith. Gaza was the internet's Vietnam.

We got just as mad at the internet letting our citizens at home see the brutality as we did with Jane Fonda and calling her "Hanoi Jane" after she traveled to Vietnam to bring light to the conflict(not a war).

I don't think there's any merit in being upset at dead children being reported because it messes with our national security goals. If the goals don't have public support with truthful reporting, they're basically illegitimate.

I would reject the notion that shifting public sentiment is a result of foreign influence campaigns, which is not to say it doesn't exist to an extent.

I've seen plenty of real information, from non-anonymous American journalists that I'm certain are the largest factor in any sea-change amongst Americans.

And despite the claim, I've yet to see solid evidence of large, pakistan-based accounts wielding massive influence on twitter. Most anonymous accounts that focus on current events tend to be located in America, Europe, or Canada from what I've seen.