William Collins scoops Shimer's history of electoral interference

William Collins has scooped a “brilliant and timely” book on a century of electoral interference by David Shimer.

In his first acquisition since joining as editorial director from Wildfire, Shoaib Rokadiya bought UK and Commonwealth rights to Rigged: America, Russia and One Hundred Years of Covert Electoral Interference from Matilda Forbes Watson at WME. The book will be released on 30th June.

The synopsis explains: “Russia’s interference in the 2016 US election marked only the latest chapter of a hidden and revelatory history. Ahead of another highly anticipated election this November, David Shimer sheds light on nearly 70 years of secret operations – by the CIA, the KGB, and Vladimir Putin’s Russia – to shape electoral outcomes around the world. Melding deep historical research with more than 130 ground-breaking interviews, including a former US President and a KGB general, Rigged will not only reveal new details of Russia’s involvement in 2016 and how the United States responded but how such state-led intervention has been prevalent for much longer than we think.”

Shimer is currently working towards a doctorate in international relations at the University of Oxford as a Marshall Scholar. His reporting and analysis have appeared in the New York Times, the New Yorker and Foreign Affairs.

Rokadiya said: “Free and fair elections are at the heart of the democratic process but, as David Shimer shows in this book, they have never been under greater threat across the world than now. Rigged is an enormously ambitious and eye-opening call-to-arms for us to strengthen our democracies from within before it is too late.”