It wasn't just the sitting president who inflamed debate about NFL players who protested racial inequality and police brutality by kneeling during the national anthem.
According to a report from Andrew Beaton of the Wall Street Journal, Twitter accounts linked to the Internet Research Agency—"the Russian and Kremlin-backed company accused of attempting to sow discord in the U.S."—sent thousands of tweets about the NFL and the national anthem.
Beaton cited figures from Clemson University researchers that revealed 491 accounts linked to the agency tweeted 12,000 times about the league and anthem controversy from the end of 2014 through the middle of 2018.