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Facebook Exec Rob Goldman is Very Sorry He Helped Trump's Ploy to Discredit The Russia Investigation

Facebook’s vice president of advertising, Rob Goldman, just learned an important lesson about tweeting—namely, that he should never do it. The Department of Justice on Friday indicted 13 people for their alleged involvement in Russia’s Internet Research Agency, which used Facebook to spread propaganda in an effort to influence the 2016 US election, among other efforts. In a foolhardy move, Goldman responded to the indictment by tweeting his own thoughts regarding Russian interference on the platform—a move for which he is now very sorry. “Most of the coverage of Russian meddling involves their attempt to effect the outcome of the 2016 US election. I have seen all of the Russian ads and I can say very definitively that swaying the election was *NOT* the main goal,” he tweeted. Goldman’s claim that “swaying the election was *NOT* the main goal” of Russia’s propaganda ads was subsequently shared by President Trump, in an apparent attempt to discredit Mueller’s sweeping investigation, which also includes a probe into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russian operatives and whether the president obstructed justice by firing former FBI Director James Comey last May. “The Fake News Media never fails,” Trump tweeted on Saturday along with Goldman’s tweet. “Hard to ignore this fact from the Vice President of Facebook Ads, Rob Goldman!”