Nina Jankowicz, the former and brief executive director of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)’s Disinformation Governance Board, has a new non-profit group called the American Sunlight Project (ASP). The group aims to combat what it believes is a concerted campaign by conservatives to target and discredit disinformation researchers like Jankowicz. The former DHS employee was the subject of blistering criticism in 2022 over her embrace of pro-Biden government propaganda narratives on social media.
The new organization, led by Jankowicz and Carlos Álvarez-Aranyos, has hit the ground running — already accusing several House Republican committee chairmen of using their constitutional subpoena power to silence think tanks and disinformation researchers. “These tactics echo the dark days of McCarthyism, but with a frightening 21st-century twist,” Jaknowicz and Álvarez-Aranyos wrote in a letter published yesterday, leveling a series of hyperbolic accusations against House Republican leaders.
Despite her concerns about ongoing disinformation operations, Jankowicz participated in at least two such initiatives herself in 2020.
The former DHS employee publicly praised the discredited Steele dossier author, Christopher Steele, on social media. After an appearance by the British spy on the Infotagion podcast, Jankowicz posted to X (formerly Twitter), “Listened to this last night — Chris Steele (yes THAT Chris Steele) provides some great historical context about the evolution of disinfo. Worth a listen.” The alleged disinformation expert also dismissed the Hunter Biden laptop — confirmed by the Department of Justice and FBI as authentic — as “a Russian influence op.”
The American Sunlight Project–whose acronym ASP recalls the name of several venomous snake species found in the Nile region of Africa and the European vipera aspis — has a board comprised of several notable figures — including NeverTrumper Katie Harbath, a former Facebook executive and Republican operative; Ineke Mushovic, who leads a think tank that tracks “threats to democracy” and gay, lesbian, transgender movements; and Benjamin Wittes, the resident Deep State apologist at the Brookings Institute, which was primarily backed by the government of Qatar until 2017.