One of the things the Democrats have been trying to do is to label any conservative group as Russian influenced and any conservative social media operation as the responsibility of Russian bot-farms.

This was foreshadowed in the testimony that Glenn Simpson gave to the House Intelligence Committee

Simpson on Russians infiltrating the @NRA: "- it appears the Russians infiltrated the NRA And there is more than one
explanation for why. I would say broadly speaking, it appears that the Russian operation was designed to infiltrate conservative organizations.” pic.twitter.com/91FvD2X79k

— Christina Wilkie (@christinawilkie) January 18, 2018

and there was this nugget:

We have done some research on some religious groups having relationships with the Russians, having, developing, and pursuing relationships with various religious groups. … There has been a lot of that.

The #SchumerShutdown trending hashtag was blamed on Russians:

As lawmakers wage a messaging war over who caused the government shutdown, Republicans and the White House are getting a big boost in their efforts to blame Democrats for the mess ― from the Russians.

#SchumerShutdown ― the hashtag that GOP leaders and the White House are using to accuse Democrats of causing the shutdown ― on Sunday night became the top trending hashtag being promoted by Russian bots and trolls on Twitter, according to the Alliance for Securing Democracy, a project led by former top national security officials from both parties.

Last week the mewling and sniveling about Russia influence driving the popularity of the #ReleaseTheMemo hashtag began. As PT Barnum said, you can fool some of the people all of the time. This, of course, refers to the memo prepared by House Intelligence Committee staff that documents anti-Trump bias on the part of senior FBI officials and abuses of FISA to conduct political surveillance.

Hill Dems suggest House Intel 'FISA abuse' memo, #releasethememo calls, are part of Russian attack on US. pic.twitter.com/2lIMX3zuCI

— Byron York (@ByronYork) January 23, 2018

Well, Twitter took Schiff seriously, something one should never do with this bug-eyed little pencil neck, and did the research:

But a knowledgeable source says that Twitter’s internal analysis has thus far found that authentic American accounts, and not Russian imposters or automated bots, are driving #ReleaseTheMemo. There are no preliminary indications that the Twitter activity either driving the hashtag or engaging with it is either predominantly Russian.

In short, according to this source, who would not speak to The Daily Beast for attribution, the retweets are coming from inside the country.

The source pointed to influential American users on the right, including Donald Trump Jr., with his 2.49 million followers, pushing the hashtag forward. It’s become a favorite of far-right Republican congressmen, including Steve King, who claimed the still-secret memo shows the FBI was behaving “worse than Watergate” in one viral tweet. Mark Meadows called it an “absolutely shocking” display of “FISA abuses,” referring to a counterintelligence process.

If they ever research #SchumerShutdown, they are going to find exactly the same thing.

The surprise is that anyone is surprised by this. There are only two classes of people that believe a nation with the population of Japan and the GDP of New York State can drive American politics: poltroons and idiots.

What the left is doing is building a narrative that any opposition to their preferred outcomes is Russian influenced.