How Lauren Chen went from ‘alt-lite’ YouTuber to alleged Russian asset

Long before Lauren Chen allegedly aided a Russian propaganda operation, she built an audience posting right-wing videos under the name "Roaming Millennial."

Lauren Chen brings people together.

When the Russians were on the hunt for American influencers to produce propaganda, they hired a conservative YouTuber to scout for stars, according to the Department of Justice. And Chen, unnamed by the DOJ but identified by NBC News from business records, delivered. She connected employees of the Russian state media operation RT with unwitting right-wing content creators and their millions of followers, according to a federal indictment unsealed last week.

Chen, co-owner with her husband, producer Liam Donovan, of Tenet Media, an online collective of pro-Trump creators, negotiated a series of lucrative deals with the high-profile influencers to pump out online videos — in what turned out to be a nearly $10 million covert Russian propaganda campaign, the DOJ alleged. The DOJ did not name Tenet Media but NBC News identified the company based on its description in the indictment.

Unlike the influencers alleged to have been victims of RT and Tenet Media, who denied knowing they were working for Russia, Chen has said nothing since the indictment made news. Chen, who is referred to as “Founder-1” in the indictment, did not respond to requests for comment. She has not been charged with a crime.

Lauren Chen on the set of "Candace" in Nashville, Tenn., in 2021.Jason Davis / Getty ImagesYears before she would allegedly recruit famous conservative influencers for Russia’s propaganda operation, including Dave Rubin, Tim Pool, Benny Johnson and Lauren Southern, Chen served as another type of conduit. At a time when the alt-right was just forming its online network — a community on YouTube, where the loudest and most reactionary voices got rich and famous and leaned on one another’s growing audiences to become more so — Chen gained a following by bridging some of the internet’s most noxious far-right voices to more mainstream conservative creators. 

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/lauren-chen-russia-ties-roaming-millennial-youtuber-rcna170369

---