This is an absolutely bombshell: the story about the cancelled elections in Romania is even far more sinister than previously thought.
A new report from investigative outlet snoop.ro (snoop.ro/anaf-a-descope…) reveals that the TikTok campaign which was cited in the declassified Romanian intelligence documents (summarized in my post below 👇) as evidence of foreign interference - and used as grounds to cancel the presidential election - was actually paid for by the ruling National Liberal Party (PNL), the very party that supported cancelling the elections!
According to the investigation, the campaign called "#EchilibrușiVerticalitate" that the intelligence services claimed was "identical to Russian operations in Ukraine" was organized by a marketing firm called Kensington Communication, hired by PNL (the ruling party), who paid Kensington over 1 million RON for it (about $210,000). Kensington then used a platform called FameUp to coordinate 130 influencers with specific scripts and messaging guidelines.
This puts the declassified intelligence documents in an entirely new light. What they presented as evidence of foreign interference was actually a campaign paid for by the ruling party. The same party that then supported using these allegations of "foreign interference" to cancel an election they were losing.
Even more bizarrely, confronted by journalists, Kensington Communication initially denied using the hashtag but later admitted to creating the campaign for PNL, claiming it was meant to be called "#echilibrusiseriozitate" and was changed to "#echilibrusiverticalitate" without their knowledge. Yeah, right...
This means that either the Romanian intelligence services didn't know this was a PNL-funded campaign when they used it as evidence to cancel the election (which raises huge questions about their competence), or they did know and didn't disclose it (which raises even bigger questions about their integrity).
In any case, it seems to indicate that something extremely sinister happened in Romania: a ruling party used intelligence services to cancel an election based on "foreign interference" evidence that they themselves paid for!
A new report from investigative outlet snoop.ro (snoop.ro/anaf-a-descope…) reveals that the TikTok campaign which was cited in the declassified Romanian intelligence documents (summarized in my post below 👇) as evidence of foreign interference - and used as grounds to cancel the presidential election - was actually paid for by the ruling National Liberal Party (PNL), the very party that supported cancelling the elections!
According to the investigation, the campaign called "#EchilibrușiVerticalitate" that the intelligence services claimed was "identical to Russian operations in Ukraine" was organized by a marketing firm called Kensington Communication, hired by PNL (the ruling party), who paid Kensington over 1 million RON for it (about $210,000). Kensington then used a platform called FameUp to coordinate 130 influencers with specific scripts and messaging guidelines.
This puts the declassified intelligence documents in an entirely new light. What they presented as evidence of foreign interference was actually a campaign paid for by the ruling party. The same party that then supported using these allegations of "foreign interference" to cancel an election they were losing.
Even more bizarrely, confronted by journalists, Kensington Communication initially denied using the hashtag but later admitted to creating the campaign for PNL, claiming it was meant to be called "#echilibrusiseriozitate" and was changed to "#echilibrusiverticalitate" without their knowledge. Yeah, right...
This means that either the Romanian intelligence services didn't know this was a PNL-funded campaign when they used it as evidence to cancel the election (which raises huge questions about their competence), or they did know and didn't disclose it (which raises even bigger questions about their integrity).
In any case, it seems to indicate that something extremely sinister happened in Romania: a ruling party used intelligence services to cancel an election based on "foreign interference" evidence that they themselves paid for!
Also, interestingly, Politico is completely misrepresenting this bombshell investigation: politico.eu/article/invest…
Let me show you how they're trying to spin it.
Politico claims that the investigation shows that "a campaign from a governing center-right party may have been hijacked to benefit far-right candidate." They're framing PNL as being a victim here, seeing their TikTok campaign "hijacked to benefit Georgescu".
But the snoop.ro investigation demolishes this narrative with hard evidence because they found Kensington's (PNL's contractor) original brief and proved influencers were following their exact scripts. The investigation shows exact matches between the script and influencer videos. How is that "hijacking" when the influencers were doing exactly what the brief told them to do?
Most importantly, Politico completely buries the lead: a ruling party paid for a social media campaign that was then used by intelligence services as evidence of 'foreign interference' to cancel an election. That's not a 'hijacking' - that's an explosive scandal about potential abuse of intelligence services for political purposes.
This isn't sloppy journalism - it's active misrepresentation. Politico has access to the same snoop.ro investigation we're reading. They chose to ignore the documented evidence of word-for-word script following and instead push this 'hijacking' narrative that the evidence explicitly contradicts.
Instead of investigating how a ruling party's campaign ended up being used as evidence to cancel a democratic election, Politico is helping construct a cover story. They're turning what appears to be potential intelligence service abuse into a story about campaign "hijacking".
Which means we potentially have another major scandal on our hands here: major EU media outlets - the same EU media outlets that regularly lecture about threats to democracy - appear to help obscure what might be the most serious abuse of intelligence services for political purposes in recent EU history.
Let me show you how they're trying to spin it.
Politico claims that the investigation shows that "a campaign from a governing center-right party may have been hijacked to benefit far-right candidate." They're framing PNL as being a victim here, seeing their TikTok campaign "hijacked to benefit Georgescu".
But the snoop.ro investigation demolishes this narrative with hard evidence because they found Kensington's (PNL's contractor) original brief and proved influencers were following their exact scripts. The investigation shows exact matches between the script and influencer videos. How is that "hijacking" when the influencers were doing exactly what the brief told them to do?
Most importantly, Politico completely buries the lead: a ruling party paid for a social media campaign that was then used by intelligence services as evidence of 'foreign interference' to cancel an election. That's not a 'hijacking' - that's an explosive scandal about potential abuse of intelligence services for political purposes.
This isn't sloppy journalism - it's active misrepresentation. Politico has access to the same snoop.ro investigation we're reading. They chose to ignore the documented evidence of word-for-word script following and instead push this 'hijacking' narrative that the evidence explicitly contradicts.
Instead of investigating how a ruling party's campaign ended up being used as evidence to cancel a democratic election, Politico is helping construct a cover story. They're turning what appears to be potential intelligence service abuse into a story about campaign "hijacking".
Which means we potentially have another major scandal on our hands here: major EU media outlets - the same EU media outlets that regularly lecture about threats to democracy - appear to help obscure what might be the most serious abuse of intelligence services for political purposes in recent EU history.
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