President Trump early Friday called reports of Kremlin-linked groups buying Facebook ads to sway the 2016 presidential election part of a “Russia hoax.”
“The Russia hoax continues, now it’s ads on Facebook. What about the totally biased and dishonest Media coverage in favor of Crooked Hillary?” Trump tweeted, referring to former Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.
Facebook has told investigators that it discovered thousands of political ads published on its platform over the past two years were linked to fake accounts based in Russia.
{mosads}Alex Stamos, Facebook’s chief security officer, made the revelation in a blog post Wednesday. Stamos said that 470 inauthentic accounts spent about $100,000 to buy roughly 3,000 ads. He added that the accounts have since been suspended.
On Thursday Facebook announced it would turn over the ads to congressional investigators.
Trump has expressed his doubts of Russian interference in the 2016 election, often suggesting Democrats are using the Russia probe as an excuse for losing the presidency.
“As the phony Russian Witch Hunt continues, two groups are laughing at this excuse for a lost election taking hold, Democrats and Russians!” Trump tweeted in July.
Clinton has cited WikiLeaks’s release of her campaign chairman’s emails before the November election as a reason for her loss to Trump, including in her new tell-all book about her campaign titled “What Happened.”