Nearly 1 in 4 Americans look to podcasts for their news, almost 9 out of 10 expect the information they hear to be mostly accurate, and 8 out of 10 view them as equally or more trustworthy than news they receive from other sources.

However, podcasting remains a largely under-examined space, where content can be highly opinionated and politicized. Anyone can start a podcast or claim expertise on a subject, content moderation is largely absent, and the spread of contested claims is common. These factors suggest that the podcasting ecosystem could be a fertile area for malicious foreign actors to exert influence. How worried should we be?

In a new report, Jessica Brandt, Bret Schafer, Valerie Wirtschafter, and Peter Benzoni look at whether and how Kremlin narratives spread across popular American podcasts, highlighting the complex ways that Russian propaganda interacts with U.S. domestic political discourse.