Peter Smith
Canadian Anti-Hate Network
Image taken of Lauren Southern and Lauren Chen during a 2021 interview on Chen’s channel. Source: YouTube
An indictment from the United States Department of Justice has named a YouTube network hosting right-wing content creators as “covertly fund[ed]“ by employees of RT, formerly Russia Today—a Russian state-owned media outlet.
An indictment filed in the Southern District of New York names Russian nationals Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afansyeva, alleging violations of the US Foreign Agents Registration Act, and conspiracy to launder almost $10 million through payments to Tenet Media.
RT was sanctioned after the outset of the Russia-Ukraine war, forcing it to shut down operations in Europe, the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada. In response, RT’s editor-in-chief was quoted as developing an "entire empire of covert projects" to influence public opinion in "Western audiences."
The network is not named in the incitement, but it is described as a "network of heterodox commentators that focus on Western political and cultural issues." This description mirrors Tenet Media’s About Us page on its website.
Screenshot taken from Tenet Media’s About Us page.
Founded by Canadian YouTube personality Lauren Chen and Tenet’s president Liam Donovan, Tenet Media is home to some of the largest conservative political commentators on YouTube. Among its roster are big names in digital content including Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, and Benny Johnson.
It is not clear who, if any of the content creators working for Tenet were aware of the deal, and parts of the indictment claim that two of Tenet’s hires were “deceived” by the company. While not named, journalist Aric Toler pointed out on X these two appear to be Rubin and Pool who have 2.4 million and 1.37 million subscribers respectively, which match the totals of the creators mentioned in the indictment.
To provide a screen for the funding, the indictment alleges that there was an elaborate fiction created around a man named Eduard Grigoriann to convince Tenet’s founders and potential contractors. Said to be an “accomplished finance professional" who had held various roles in Brussels and France at a multinational bank including "Director of Private Banking Division and Wealth Management.”
Grigoriann does not exist, and it is alleged that another person created a fake profile boosting Grigoriann’s bona fides. The same unnamed person is also believed to have created two other personas to sell the lie of Grigoriann’s existence.
A fictional profile created discussing Eduard Grigoriann. Source: Department of Justice
The payments were allegedly made through a series of shell corporations, with two entities being named in Hungary and Czechia. Some payments were handled by a Canadian company, while other payments, like the payments to content creators, went through the US.
Tenet Media
Tenet Media is owned by its directors Liam Donovan and Canadian Lauren Chen (Lauren Yu Sum Tam), with Chen also working as a YouTube video creator, albeit with a viewership much lower than the company’s primary products, figures like Pool and Southern.
Initially called “Roaming Millennial Incorporated,” Chen’s former account name on YouTube, the Canadian branch of the business was set up in Quebec during 2017, according to filings with Corporations Canada. A similar American entity was registered in Nashville, Tennessee in 2022 as Roaming USA Corp by Liam Donovan, which also operates as Tenet Media.
Chen developed her brand much like another member of the Tenet roster, Lauren Southern, by creating videos that reinforced popular arguments against left-leaning or progressive politics. Chen often cast her opponents as individuals who hated traditional beauty standards or were hostile toward traditional concepts of femininity. She typically lambasts transgender people for either propagating and/or being victimized by “gender ideology.”
Tenet Media followed this tone, focusing on recruiting talent making content through an anti-immigration and anti-transgender lens.
In the wake of the news, Blaze Media, a conservative media company fired Chen as a contributor, according to the publication Semafor. Neither Chen nor Donovan, her husband, have been charged in relation to the case.
A screen capture of some of the content promoted on the Tenet Media YouTube channel. Source: YouTube.
RT and RT France were removed from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission’s (CRTC) listing of approved non-Canadian programming services in 2022. The indictment claims that approximately 90% of Tenet’s funding came from the $9.7 million USD provided by the two named RT employees.
“Canada has been working in close cooperation with the U.S. and other allies on this serious matter,” the Minister of Public Safety, Democratic Institutions and Intergovernmental Affairs said in a statement on Thursday. “While we are unable to comment on ongoing investigations, we are united in confronting Russia’s aggression and subversion against democratic societies and we will not hesitate to take any actions necessary to hold Russian threat actors to account.”
The statement added that any Canadians who assist in “Russia’s persistent attempts” to use “disinformation, criminal and covert activities, and corruption” will face prosecution.
Chen did not respond to an email from CAHN requesting comment on the indictment.
Southern Exposure
Among the personalities signed onto Tenet is Canadian content creator Lauren Southern. A B.C. woman with longstanding connections to far-right organizations and media, Southern has continued to develop her career as a live streamer.
There are 94 videos published by Southern on the Tenet media channel; unlike several of the content creators employed by Tenet, she has not commented on the indictment publicly. Southern did not respond to an emailed request for comment by the time of publication.
Southern’s initial claim to fame during the mid-2010s was as a prominent and incendiary YouTube creator focused on Islamophobic content. Beginning her career at Rebel News, she dropped out of university after being offered a role at the company. She produced content for them until 2017 when she left to pursue time producing films independently.
It was during this time that Southern began to develop a relationship with Martin Sellner, the then-leader of Generation Identity’s Austrian branch, a far-right and anti-immigration group. In May 2017, Southern, Sellner, and members of Generation Identity attempted to use a raft to block a ship run by NGO Doctors Without Borders after disembarking from a port in Italy.
“If the politicians won’t stop the boats, we’ll stop the boats,” Southern said, igniting an emergency flare. She and the others were taken into custody shortly after, with little done to impede the vessel from providing aid to people crossing the Mediterranean Sea.
In 2020, the Canadian Anti-Hate Network published a detailed investigation into Generation Identity’s Canadian branch, ID Canada.
Southern’s content during this period dealt heavily with the Great Replacement conspiracy theory, the idea that white European people are being systematically out-bred and purposefully disenfranchised in their home countries.
Despite taking a break from content creation in 2019 after getting married, her more recent content for Tenet includes calling Canada a “communist hellhole,” “how Indian scams will be the death of Canada,” and blaming immigration for “destroy[ing]” her home town of Surrey, BC.
