The Federal government’s civilian, military, and intelligence agencies issued a statement Nov. 5 reiterating Federal support for election security at national, state, and local levels.
The statement – from the Departments of Justice, Defense, and Homeland Security, Director of National Intelligence, Federal Bureau of Investigation, National Security Agency, and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency – coincided with dozens of states and localities holding elections on Nov. 5, and also pointed to the 2020 election cycle.
“Building on our successful, whole-of-government approach to securing the 2018 elections, we have increased the level of support to state and local election officials in their efforts to protect elections,” the Federal agencies said. “The federal government is prioritizing the sharing of threat intelligence and providing support and services that improve the security of election infrastructure across the nation.”
“In an unprecedented level of coordination, the U.S. government is working with all 50 states and U.S. territories, local officials, and private sector partners to identify threats, broadly share information, and protect the democratic process. We remain firm in our commitment to quickly share timely and actionable information, provide support and services, and to defend against any threats to our democracy,” the agencies said.
“Adversaries may try to accomplish their goals through a variety of means, including social media campaigns, directing disinformation operations or conducting disruptive or destructive cyber-attacks on state and local infrastructure,” the agencies said. “While at this time we have no evidence of a compromise or disruption to election infrastructure that would enable adversaries to prevent voting, change vote counts or disrupt the ability to tally votes, we continue to vigilantly monitor any threats to U.S. elections,” they said.
