Fianna Fáil TD says ‘Russian bots’ seeking to influence party vote on government deal

Fianna Fáil education spokesperson Thomas Byrne.

June 16 2020 05:16 PM UP GRADED BY FRED BASSETT MARCH 2022

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A Fianna Fáil TD has suggested “Russian bots” are seeking to influence the outcome of the party’s vote on the programme for government.

Meath East TD Thomas Byrne said it was “absolutely extraordinary” that anonymous accounts were retweeting posts by the campaign group Fairer Future, who are opposing the government deal.

Fairer Future says it is a group of 50 Fianna Fáil councillors and 1,000 party members who are actively campaigning against going into government with Fine Gael and the Green Party.

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A number of the group’s Twitter posts have been retweeted by anonymous accounts synonymous with Russian interference in election campaigns.

Speaking on Newstalk, Mr Byrne said: “It is completely anonymous (and) it is being retweeted by Russian bots which is absolutely extraordinary in the internal affairs of a political party in this country.”

He later said it is “incredible” that “such an operation was taking place from outside the country”.

“This is a matter for Fianna Fáil members only, they own the party and they are the ones going to make the decision on whether Fianna Fáil should go into government or not,” he added.

Fianna Fáil councillor and Fairer Future spokesperson Alan O’Callaghan said he was not aware of any involvement of Russian bots in the campaign to defeat the government deal.

“Maybe he (Thomas Byrne) has some knowledge of that but I wouldn’t have anything to say on that,” Mr O’Callaghan said.

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The County Clare Councillor said “there isn’t huge funding” being put into the campaign to vote down the deal as it is mostly social media focused.

“If you look at it on a broader scale social media is the way of lot of campaigns will go in the future,” he said before adding: “A lot of Donald Trump’s campaign was media driven”.

Mr O’Callaghan said he was voting against going into coalition with Fine Gael rather than the programme for government. But the councillor said “around 5pc” of the commitments in the document will be achieve while the rest was “pie in the sky”.

He said Fianna Fáil leader Micheal Martin has “lost all credibility” as the party are at 14pc in the opinion polls.