Lee Stranahan

Lee Stranahan is an American writer who worked for Sputnik, a Russian government-controlled news agency. He previously worked for Breitbart News, and has written for The Huffington Post and Daily Kos.

Media career For some years, Stranahan worked as a television producer and graphic illustrator in Los Angeles, California. He had a sideline in erotic photography. Stranahan later said the videos led to a job writing political comedy for The Huffington Post.

Breitbart News Stranahan met Andrew Breitbart while working on assignment in 2010. The two men soon became friends, and Breitbart converted Stranahan to conservatism, became his mentor, and hired him to work at Breitbart News. In 2013, he was an active critic of Deric Lostutter's "KYAnonymous campaign". He left Breitbart News in 2013 and was re-hired. In 2014, he was fired from Breitbart News on what he disputed as false allegations. In July 2016, Stranahan was arrested while covering a protest over the death of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

During the 2016 US presidential election, while working for Breitbart News, Stranahan communicated with Russian hackers via Guccifer 2.0 to leak illicitly obtained material about the Democratic Party. Stranahan claimed on Twitter in March 2017 that he had introduced Guccifer 2.0 to Roger Stone. Stranahan, managed to obtain material from Guccifer 2.0 about Black Lives Matter. In July 2018, Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted 12 Russian agents and described Guccifer 2.0 as a Russian government front. Mueller's indictment referred to an unnamed reporter who had conferred with the Russians about the timing of a leak; Stranahan has confirmed that he was the journalist concerned. He has said he was the reporter mentioned over the theft of material concerning Black Lives Matter. Stranahan had been attending the briefings for several weeks while identifying himself as a Breitbart reporter and trying to ask White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer a question about CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity technology company that handled the Democratic National Committee's servers during the 2016 election. A few months later, Stranahan was highly critical of the Breitbart editor-in-chief, Alex Marlow, in part for perceived treachery in accepting the Russian hack happened during the 2016 presidential election.

Sputnik News After accepting an approach from Radio Sputnik, Stranahan announced in April 2017 that he was the co-host of a new radio show for the radio station called Fault Lines with Nixon and Stranahan co-hosted with Garland Nixon. He said he "doesn't have any qualms" with being "on the Russian payroll" and that the content of his show was not restricted in any way.

He left Sputnik in February 2024.

Filmography 2012 — Occupy Unmasked, as Journalist