The U.S. government has made a number of convictions related to election interference, according to public remarks made to the Election Threats Task Force (ETTF) by Attorney General Merrick Garland. He emphasized the seriousness which the Department of Justice (DOJ) takes in securing the nation’s elections, together with its partners at the local and state level. The Attorney General was accompanied by the Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco and the Director FBI, Christopher Wray, who also provided perspective. The trio noted how partnership and preparedness are key.
Attorney General on the ETTF
The ETTF, organized in 2021, includes a variety of components to include a civil rights division, criminal public integrity section, and a national security section which includes the FBI to protect the nation’s elections from foreign or malign inputs and cyber campaigns. The AG cited the convictions in both Arizona and Iowa of citizens who had physically threatened election workers. Garland noted emphatically that every election worker, volunteer or official, must be able to do their job without fearing for their safety or those of their families. He concluded his remarks with the pledge that the DOJ will protect democracy and election workers across the country.
technology takes center stage in election interference
The Deputy AG highlighted the role of technology in the perpetrator’s efforts to interfere with the nation’s elections. She specifically called out the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) as being the most destructive. Noting how AI is being leveraged to create and misinform the populace via deep fakes, to threaten election workers, and call into question the integrity of the nation’s elections. She also put a marker down announcing that enhanced sentencing will be sought for those using AI and other advanced technologies to interfere with elections.
FBI Director Wray spotlighted the FBI’s dedication to ensuring every citizen may exercise their fundamental right to vote. He noted that election threats and interference are not geographically isolated, as all 56 FBI divisions have election interference cases active.
Chairman of SSCI On election interference
Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence commented at a session during the RSA Conference, “Ensuring Intelligence, National Security in a Rapidly Changing Technology World” that the U.S. intelligence community’s efforts were extraordinary in successfully highlighting the level of disinformation which occurred in 2020. He then referenced a case of how Russian proxies in 2017 had their social network voices sitting on both sides of issues and put together events so that Americans would clash, as was the case in Houston . He stated that he feels the Russian playbook used in 2020 is now being widely used by other nations and he fears the U.S. may have been better protected in 2020 than we are in 2024. He went on to cite four reasons:
- The tools that Russian used are now available to other nation states, to include quasi-adversaries now are able to see the effectiveness in interfering in U.S. elections.
- Many more Americans accept a lot of “crazy stuff” they acquire off social media platforms as true.
- The concerted effort to keep government (law enforcement) from having any contact with social media companies (this silenced the government’s ability to provide insight for a period of more than six months as the effort worked its way through the U.S. legal system).
- The enormous power of AI which brings speed and scale to disinformation which wasn’t possible in 2020.
Heading into the 2024 elections it is quite sobering that the Chair of the SSCI feels there will be more attempts to push disinformation/misinformation in efforts to undermine the integrity of the nation’s elections, and the FBI has open cases in all 56 field divisions.
