Preparing for potential election threats
Homeland Security monitoring and training for number of scenarios
WASHINGTON – The Department of Homeland Security is preparing for a potentially unprecedented array of election threats including meddling by foreign governments, bomb threats, intimidation and disinformation, Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told USA TODAY in an exclusive interview.
“We are dealing with it with intensity,” Mayorkas said. “The right to vote and the integrity of the right to vote − and therefore of the election itself − is a fundamental element of our democracy.”
He stressed, “This is a nonpartisan effort.”
In January 2017, in response to Russia’s aggressive attempt to meddle in the 2016 presidential election and hack the Democratic National Committee’s servers, DHS designated the election process as part of the nation’s “critical infrastructure.” That means electionrelated assets, systems and networks are considered “so vital to the United States that their incapacitation or destruction would have a debilitating effect.”
According to Mayorkas, Homeland Security is monitoring three main types of threats.
One is the cybersecurity threat to the integrity of U.S. elections, “very often by adverse nation-states,” Mayorkas said.
U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that Russia, as well as China, Iran and perhaps other nations, have continued to meddle in the U.S. electoral process, though with less intensity than Russia did in 2016.
Another, Mayorkas said, is the physical threat to local election officials and poll workers. That has already spiked since the 2020 election and former President Donald Trump’s false claims of voter fraud.
The third risk, Mayorkas said, is the “threat of disinformation,” including the spreading of intentionally untrue information about voting.
A spotlight squarely on elections − and Homeland Security
Election security experts agreed that conflicts will intensify during the rematch between President Joe Biden and Trump, who falsely claims the 2020 election he lost was rigged against him.
“The threat is superheated, extremely complex, extremely volatile, and there’s a variety of threat actors and a variety of methods that they may use to disrupt elections,” said Elizabeth Neumann, who began serving as a senior U.S. homeland security official before the founding of DHS in 2003, including a three-year stint on the White House Homeland Security Council in the George W. Bush administration.
“It’s very difficult to protect against because we don’t know where it will manifest, when it will manifest or how it will manifest,” said Neumann. “We’re on a tinderbox. And DHS has a fundamental and very important role in helping secure our election.”
“There will be tremendous interest from state and non-state actors as they try to influence the election,” agreed William Pelfrey Jr., a professor in the homeland security/emergency preparedness program at Virginia Commonwealth University. “Disinformation, hacking of candidate and party websites, hacking of election and voting systems – these represent viable and likely targets.”
DHS isn’t going it alone, Mayorkas and other senior department officials told USA TODAY.
The agency, especially through its Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, is mobilizing more than ever before to help state and local election officials bolster election infrastructure, Mayorkas said.
And, of course, DHS will continue to collaborate with the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies to identify and neutralize threats. The Russian hackers who hacked the DNC remain particularly worrisome, according to recent intelligence.
Protecting a vast, decentralized election
In an exclusive interview with USA TODAY, Cait Conley, senior adviser to
CISA director Jen Easterly, ticked off a long list of ways that CISA and DHS more broadly are handling what she calls an unprecedented threat environment.
CISA has undertaken a range of training on threats for election offices and workers, providing “recommendations for what they can actually do to mitigate those threats,” said Conley.
“We’ve really invested significantly in the election infrastructure security,” Conley said, including providing realtime intelligence about specific disinformation efforts and ways to combat them to 3,700 local and state election entities.
Between mid-March and mid-April, Conley told USA TODAY, CISA has put out detailed guides almost weekly, including on how to secure election infrastructure against the tactics of foreign malign influence operations and a checklist for how election sites and even volunteer poll workers can bolster physical security at polling places.
CISA’s field force has done more than 400 on-site vulnerability scans and “penetration testing” to determine if particular election entities have been hacked since last year.
Conley said CISA also has provided training on specific dangers, such as how to respond to an active shooter or bomb threat.
The office is acutely aware of threats to election offers and staff, she said. CISA offers guidance on personal security, both physical and digital.
The threat of violence against election workers is already playing out in this election cycle. Last November, letters containing the potentially lethal drug fentanyl were sent to election offices in at least five states. The incident delayed counting ballots in some local elections.
DHS staff stepped in, sharing threat intelligence on fentanyl and the mailings for local election officials and putting together guidance on how to safely handle mail that may potentially have hazardous toxins, Conley said.
All these efforts will become even more important over the summer and fall, said Neumann, especially planning for potential threats on Election Day.