127
FBI Agent goes public with Russian intelligence operation that hooked Musk and Thiel
(kyivinsider.com)
this post was submitted on 17 May 2025
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This is the correct assessment. Name the agent and lay out the grooming, and now you have a story.
He has already been arrested for this, so finding out his identity shouldnt be hard. It wouldnt add anything to the story anyways. More details about how, who and when would be nice tho.
If finding out his identity weren't that hard, it would be in the story. It would otherwise be extreme journalistic malfeasance. There's an old newsroom saw: "Get the name of the dog." That's never relevant. The name of a defendant, though? That's sort of what news does so long as they aren't a minor, which doesn't seem to apply here.
But yes, the whole thing is irritatingly light on details.
Generally if it should be easy to find and you're reading a shitty article, it can be easily found in believable sources.
I'm 99.9% certain the article is talking about ex-FBI agent Johnathan Buma. There are many articles about him, but I wasn't aware of it (been tuning a lot of news out lately, tbh). All details match and he was very recently interviewed by ZDF (significant legit German news organization) for a new investigational documentary about Elon Musk. I posted it in a different comment that has video of some parts of the interview (English with German dubbed over top). There's also a link to the full documentary. I started watching it but haven't finished.