A woman who led an “I Love Russia” propaganda campaign in the United States as a citizen of both countries was charged on Tuesday with flouting federal law by failing to register as an agent of a foreign government, prosecutors said.
Staring in at least 2011, prosecutors said, the woman, Elena Branson, was a foot soldier in President Vladimir V. Putin’s aggressive campaign to “advance Russian interests” in America, communicating directly with Mr. Putin about her activities and arranging meetings for Russian officials to lobby U.S. business and government leaders.
Damian William, the U.S. attorney for New York’s Southern District, said that Ms. Branson “knew she was supposed to register as an agent of the Russian government but chose not to do so.” Instead, he added, she “instructed others regarding how to illegally avoid the same.”
In addition to being accused of violating foreign agent registration laws, Ms. Branson, 61, was charged with conspiracy to commit visa fraud and lying to federal agents. She left the United States after F.B.I. agents interviewed her in September 2020 and was at large on Tuesday, officials said. She could not be reached for comment. It was not clear if she had a lawyer.
The charges against Ms. Branson were announced as the U.S. government and American businesses continued to isolate Russia economically as punishment for its invasion of Ukraine, which began about two weeks ago. President Biden on Tuesday banned the importation of Russian oil and natural gas into the United States, and brands like McDonald’s, Coca-Cola and Starbucks suspended operations in Russia.
Without referring explicitly to the war, Mr. Williams said “current global events” highlighted “the need to detect and hinder attempts at foreign influence” of the kind his office had charged Ms. Branson with.
Her main vehicle for the propaganda initiative was the Russian Center New York, an entity she began in 2012 with the help of tens of thousands of dollars from the Russian government, according to a criminal complaint unsealed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. Ms. Branson ran the center out of her Manhattan home, the complaint says.
On its website, the center describes itself as a “community organization” whose mission is “to help the people of two great countries come to realize that true cooperation and harmony will benefit the both of us.”
Ms. Branson got approval from “the highest levels of the Russian government” before starting the center, prosecutors said. She also led the Russian Community Council of the U.S.A., which was financed at least partly by Russian government entities, the complaint says.
She used the organizations as platforms for, among other things, hosting “events designed to consolidate the Russian-speaking youth community in the United States” and staging “youth forums focused on the promotion of Russian history and culture to American youths,” prosecutors said.
The contacts Ms. Branson developed included an unidentified New York state senator, the complaint says. The senator’s link to Ms. Branson is mentioned in the complaint in relation to an October 2015 email sent to her by a Russian official with the subject line “A friendly hockey match between the Moscow Interior Ministry and New York police!”
In the email, the complaint says, the official asked Ms. Branson to work with the Police Department to arrange such a match. Ms. Branson replied via email that the senator “was willing to meet with a delegation from the Moscow government” and that he had contacted, but not yet heard back from, the police commissioner.
In a later email with the subject line “New York” that Ms. Branson sent to the Moscow official and two other people, she laid out an itinerary that included a meeting with the state senator, dinner with an unidentified “influential American” and another dinner with the senator on the Upper West Side. The complaint does not indicate whether the dinners actually occurred.
Russia-Ukraine War: Key Things to Know
Russian oil imports. President Biden banned Russian oil, natural gas and coal imports into the United States. The move, which effectively shuts off the relatively small flow of Russian fuel into the country, could further rattle global energy markets and raise gas prices.
A halt to Russian sales. After days of seeming reluctance to take a stance over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, three high-profile American food and beverage companies — McDonald’s, Coca-Cola and Starbucks — said they were pausing operations in Russia.
The key cities. Ukrainian military and civilian soldiers continued to bog down Russian forces, protecting the borders of key cities and inflicting heavy losses against the larger and better equipped Russian army.
A humanitarian crisis. Indiscriminate Russian shelling has trapped Ukrainian civilians and left tens of thousands without food, water, power or heat in besieged cities. The United Nations said that the number of refugees who have fled Ukraine has reached two million.
Ms. Branson’s other efforts to spread Russian propaganda, the complaint says, included lobbying officials in Hawaii against changing the name of a fort on the island of Kauai that is the last such remaining structure of Russian origin in the Hawaiian Islands.
The site, Fort Elizabeth, is a National Historic Landmark administered as the Russian Fort Elizabeth State Historical Park. It was built in 1817 through an alliance of the Russian-American Company and an Indigenous chief and combines Hawaiian construction with Russian design, its website says.
As part of the persuasion campaign, the complaint says, Ms. Branson organized a trip to Moscow for officials from Hawaii who would have been responsible for a potential name change to meet with high-ranking Russian government officials.
About a month after Ms. Branson was interviewed by F.B.I. agents in New York in 2020, she flew to Moscow and does not appear to have returned to the United States since, prosecutors said. About a year ago, prosecutors said, she sold the New York property where she lived and which served as the Russian Center’s office.
In an interview published by the Russian state-controlled RT outlet in October, Ms. Branson said she had left the United States for Moscow because she was “scared” and thought the “probability was very high” that she would be arrested if she stayed in the United States.
