In April, stand-up comedian and content creator Ryan Kelly says he received a compelling offer from a PR company: $25,000 to post a video stating the innocence of a Cambodian businessman accused of money laundering by the Thai government.
“The PR company sent me over a one-page of pretty much what they wanted me to say,” Kelly said, in a Friday video posted to his Instagram account. The gist, according to Kelly: The businessman is innocent and “the Thai government just needed a scapegoat.”
He didn’t accept the offer, he told Straight Arrow, because he found the claims dubious. Alongside his in-real-life work as a standup comedian, Kelly creates content about online scams, crypto and cybersecurity for 5.6 million TikTok followers, 2.5 million Instagram followers, and 1.1 million YouTube subscribers. In fact, asking him to partake in a PR campaign like this, Kelly said in his Friday video, “was a pretty big blunder.”
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“I could tell that something was fishy here. I do a ton of scam-hunting,” Kelly told Straight Arrow. “Granted, this is not where I thought it was going.”
Kelly suggested that posting the requested content could be a violation of the federal Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), which requires that anyone in the United States sharing information on behalf of a “foreign principal” must register with the Department of Justice.
At least two influencers, as well as a presswire agency, did share remarkably similar content about the businessman.
Who is involved?
The posts center on a Cambodian-born businessman called Yim Leak, whose assets have been seized by the Thai government in connection with an alleged scam and money-laundering network.
Shortly after Kelly’s Friday post, two creators removed videos they had posted about Leak over the previous months — both with scripts similar to the one Kelly said he’d been asked to make. Straight Arrow reviewed the videos before they were removed.
The most active of these creators is Ethan Levins, whose Instagram bio describes him as an independent journalist. In his bio, he declares, “Truth over narrative.”
On Friday afternoon, Straight Arrow reviewed six relevant videos on Levins’ Instagram page, which align closely with the script Kelly alleged he was provided, describing Yim Leak as a “political pawn” and “political scapegoat” in the Thai government’s case. The earliest video was posted on March 4; the latest on May 13.
After Kelly posted his video, comments began appearing under some of Levins’ videos, suggesting Levins had violated FARA by not disclosing work on behalf of a foreign agent. By Saturday afternoon, Levins’ videos were no longer available on his page.
Straight Arrow reached out to Levins several times. He has not responded.
Creator Dave Disci, whose Instagram bio includes the line “stories that make you feel,” posted a similar video to TikTok on April 30. His content includes sensationalist videos about giant spiders, as well as his appearances at red carpet events for “Bridgerton” and “Jack Ryan: Ghost War.”
His Linktree directs visitors to affiliate links for a $99 doomsday prep kit and a 67-piece “survival kit” for $44.99. On YouTube, however, Disci breaks down K-pop drama for his 271,000 subscribers.
Similar comments appeared on his Yim Leak video, suggesting that it was a violation of FARA. By Friday afternoon, it had been deleted.
Disci did not respond to Straight Arrow’s requests for comment. Nor did the talent agency that represents him, Clicks Talent, which describes itself as “a ‘New age’ talent agency set on doing it differently!”
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What laws might be involved in this case?
FARA is the law that has regulated political influence in the United States since 1938. It mandates that anyone spreading information on behalf of a non-U.S. entity must register with the Department of Justice. This includes foreign governments, political parties, people outside the U.S. and businesses and organizations operating outside the U.S. According to the DOJ website, a “willful violation” of FARA can result in up to five years in prison, a fine of up to $250,000, or both.
This is a very broad definition, but it “certainly could” cover the actions of Disci and Levins, David Sloss, professor of law at the University of Santa Clara, told Straight Arrow.
The law and enforcement around FARA have changed over time. In 2024, a group of influencers was prosecuted under FARA for working with the Russian news outlet RT through a Tennessee-based company.
A 2025 article on the analysis site Lawfare outlined the “murky regulatory environment” of FARA enforcement, describing the law as “central to the United States’s efforts to combat foreign influence as well as increasingly feared as a tool that can be used by those in power to target politically disfavored voices.” This can make enforcement complicated, as “most FARA registrable activity is not criminal — indeed, much of it is First Amendment protected.”
In February 2025, former Attorney General Pam Bondi (who had herself previously been registered under FARA) issued a memo disbanding the Foreign Influence Task Force — a group of agents within the FBI who worked together on combatting misinformation from abroad. The memo also re-focused the efforts of the Department of Justice’s criminal prosecutions on more “traditional espionage,” in order to “free resources to address more pressing priorities, and end risks of further weaponization and abuses of prosecutorial discretion.” However, in September 2025, the White House released a memorandum suggesting that FARA could be used for countering domestic terrorism and political violence.
FARA cases are still being prosecuted, however. Former Congressman David Rivera and former Fugees rapper Pras Michel have both been sentenced under the law since Bondi’s memo.
Where has the information shown up?
A Straight Arrow review of search engine results for “Yim Leak” — across multiple accounts — repeatedly found a National Law Review-hosted press release as the top result. The press release headline describes the Thai government as “doubling down on false claims.”
The April 18 press release came through a company called EIN Presswire. The same release can also be found on the AP News site with a disclaimer marking it as paid content, and stating that The Associated Press was not involved in its creation. The National Law Review also marked the information as a press release and carried a legal disclaimer from EIN Presswire against the content of the page. A page on the International Business Times site also covers the story, under the headline “Thailand’s Anti-Scam Crackdown: Protecting Citizens or Scaring Off Capital?” It is marked as “Contributor Content” rather than as news.
EIN Presswire retracted the content after Straight Arrow reached out.
“We train quite very hard about keeping that stuff out,” said EIN Presswire CEO David Rothstein, “we don’t allow reputation firms to run releases through our platform.”
Rothstein said his company had never worked with Mezink, and that the information had been sent to them from another AI-enabled marketing agency, whose account with them had now been terminated.
Gary Chodes, CEO of the National Law Review, told Straight Arrow his site could rank above other content if Google’s search engine perceives it to have strong trustworthiness as a source, which is called domain authority. He attributed this to readers’ long-time confidence in the rigorous editorial standards of the outlet’s journalism section. That section, he noted in a Monday interview with Straight Arrow, has more stringent standards than the publication applies to press releases, like the one from EIN. Chodes removed the press release from the site and asked Google to de-index it.
A representative for Mezink told Straight Arrow Monday morning that they would “check internally” regarding Kelly’s claims and as to whether anyone had worked with Leak, Levins, Disci or EIN Presswire. The company “doesn’t work on PR,” the representative said, via email.
Mezink’s company URL does not direct to a site, and its Instagram page features an AI-generated video of the founder pronouncing the company name two different ways. During the time that Straight Arrow awaited comment, the founder posted a link to Mezink’s LinkedIn jobs board on his Instagram story, saying the company was “Always Hiring.”
How does paid content work?
Read more: How an AI slop shop is flooding TikTok with pro-war disinformation
In March, political influencer Maria Comstock went viral for posts describing the varying amounts of money she has been offered by left- and right-wing political organizations to create content for them.
“For influencers, brand deals aren’t extra. They’re rent. They’re healthcare. They’re payroll for editors,” Comstock posted on LinkedIn. She described influencers as “rational actors responding to incentives,” even if their values don’t necessarily align with the organizations for which they post.
However, many influencers do not disclose that they have been paid. Consumers and followers might not realize that certain viewpoints should be treated more like advertising.
Last month, Wired reported that content creators had been offered money by a PAC called “Build American AI” to make videos critical of Chinese AI development; the videos did not disclose payment or that the organization is supported by key U.S. AI investors. The New York Times also reported that an influencer had failed to disclose a “strategic advice” fee of $100,000 in his videos supporting a campaign in the California governor’s race.
For Kelly, the biggest takeaway from the situation is how prevalent and easy it has become to spread information online.
“I’m offered money pretty regularly,” he told Straight Arrow, “and most of the time I just kind of gloss over it, but this one — honestly I could tell that it’s written by AI.” In his original conversations with Mezink, he said he was just planning to mess with a bot.
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