Russia TV Host Boasts of Interfering in U.S. Elections as Results Come In

A Kremlin propagandist has made a dig at the U.S. midterm elections as he referred to the influence that he says Moscow is wielding over them.

Vladimir Solovyov started his radio show Full Contact (Polny Contakt) on Tuesday mentioning the ballot that took place that day when Americans went to the polls and as the results had started to be counted.

"Good morning dear friends, happy interference in the U.S. elections day," he told his audience. "Today are their elections that we have to interfere in", he said in a clip which was tweeted by journalist and Russia watcher Julia Davis on Tuesday.

Solovyov has close ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin and on his daily television show on the Russia-1 channel, along with his panelists, pushes the Kremlin line regarding Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

Guests on Russian state television have boasted about Russia's role in the U.S. electoral process. In August, the anchor of 60 Minutes, Evgeny Popov, who is also a member of the Russian parliament, described how Russia is "yet to pick the new candidate for the 2024 presidential election in the U.S." as he referred to "our previous candidate, (Donald) Trump."

Although the Kremlin had always denied interference, Trump's relationship with Russia was the focus of scrutiny during his presidency and U.S. intelligence agencies concluded Moscow interfered in the 2016 and 2020 elections to help him.

Solovyov's comments came in the same week that another Putin ally, Yevgeny Prigozhin, who founded the Wagner mercenary group which is fighting for Moscow in Ukraine, said that Russia has previously interfered in U.S. elections and would continue to do so.

In a post on the Russian social-media site VKontakte, via his catering firm, Prigozhin said that the meddling in the American electoral process took place "carefully, accurately, surgically and in our own way."

Prigozhin, who is known as "Putin's chef" because of the Kremlin catering contracts his firm secured, has been accused of subverting previous U.S. elections through "troll farms," which flooded social media platforms with disinformation and conspiracy theories.

He has been sanctioned by the U.S. and the EU over allegations he tried to subvert American democracy and in July, he was named in a $10 million appeal by the U.S. State Department for information about election interference.

The New York Times reported on Saturday that Russia was trying to interfere in the U.S. midterm elections. Meanwhile, a group of Russian hackers allegedly threatened to target a major Democrat website as a "gift" to Republicans, according to the cyber security blog Cyber Shafarat.

However, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Monday that there were "no specific, credible threats." Newsweek has contacted the White House for comment.