The editor-in-chief of the Kremlin’s main propaganda outlet RT said Thursday that “masses” of its employees in the United States were quitting their jobs because they “fear for their security.”

Amid concern over Russian interference in the 2016 presidential elections, the U.S. Department of Justice has requested the state-run network to register under the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA). U.S. Congressional committees are investigating RT’s role in purchasing misleading campaign ads.

“There is another enormous negative effect we are having today,” Russia's state-run TASS news agency cited Margarita Simonyan as saying in testimony at a Russian parliamentary hearing Thursday. “People are scared, people are afraid,” she said.