Cybersecurity head says there's no chance a foreign adversary can change US election results

WASHINGTON (AP) — Security for America's election systems has become so robust that Russia, Iran or any other foreign adversary will not be able to alter the outcome of this year’s presidential race, the head of the nation’s cybersecurity agency said Wednesday.

Jen Easterly told The Associated Press in an interview that voting, ballot-counting and other election infrastructure is more secure today than it’s ever been.

“Malicious actors, even if they tried, could not have an impact at scale such that there would be a material effect on the outcome of the election,” said Easterly, director of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

Federal agencies have warned of growing attempts by Russia and Iran in particular to influence voters before the Nov. 5 election and election conspiracy theories have left millions of Americans doubting the validity of election results.

Easterly said those efforts are primarily aimed at sowing discord among Americans and undermining faith in the security of the nation’s elections.

U.S. officials have spent recent months warning through criminal charges, sanctions and public advisories that foreign adversaries are ramping up their efforts to influence the White House contest between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris.

The Biden administration last month seized more than two dozen Kremlin-run fake websites and charged two Russian state media employees in a scheme to covertly fund right-wing influencers.

Last week, three Iranian operatives were charged with hacking Trump’s campaign in what the Justice Department says was part of a sweeping effort to undermine the former president and erode confidence in the U.S. electoral system.

Intelligence agencies and tech companies have tracked both Russian and Iranian actors using fake websites and social media profiles to spread misinformation, stoke division and potentially sway American voters. Iran and Russia have sought to influence past U.S. elections through online disinformation and hacking.

Easterly noted that China also was “very interested” in influencing the 2024 election.

Beyond the influence campaigns, she said her agency had not detected any activity targeting election systems.

“We have not seen specific cyber activity designed to interfere with actual election infrastructure or processes,” Easterly said.

The prevalence of election misinformation has become a widespread concern, with secretaries of state and some larger local election offices establishing specific efforts to combat it.

U.S. Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, a Democrat who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee, last week wrote a letter to Easterly that urged the agency to take further steps against election misinformation and disinformation, including coordinating with social media platforms to combat false claims.

In the interview, Easterly acknowledged “a very convoluted, very confusing information environment,” and said her agency works with election officials to promote accurate information. However, she also made it clear that her agency does not monitor social media sites or attempt to moderate their content.

“That is not our role,” she said.

She encouraged voters who question how elections are run to contact their local election office and even volunteer to serve as poll workers so they understand the process and the safeguards already in place.

“There will be a lot of information out there in the coming months. It will be up to every voter to be able to understand the signal from the noise,” Easterly said. “That trusted signal is coming from your state and local election officials.”

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Director of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Jen Easterly speaks to The Associated Press in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Jen Easterly speaks to The Associated Press in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Director of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Jen Easterly speaks to The Associated Press in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Director of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Jen Easterly speaks to The Associated Press in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

This image provided by the FBI shows three accused hackers, Seyyed Ali Aghamiri, Yasar Balaghi and Masoud Jalili, who were employed by Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, as the Justice Department unsealed criminal charges Friday, Sept. 27, 2024, against the three Iranian operatives suspected of hacking former President Donald Trump's campaign and disseminating stolen information to media organizations. (FBI via AP)

Cybersecurity head says there's no chance a foreign adversary can change US election results

Cybersecurity head says there's no chance a foreign adversary can change US election results

In this combination of photos taken in Pennsylvania, Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign event, Aug. 18, 2024, in Rochester, left, and Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event, Aug. 19, 2024, in York. (AP Photo)

WASHINGTON (AP) — A trio of new trials — a devastating hurricane, expanding conflict in the Mideast and a dockworkers strike that threatens the U.S. economy — are looming over the final weeks of the presidential campaign and could help shape the public mood as voters decide between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump.

How events shake out — and how the candidates respond — could be decisive as they claw for votes in battleground states.

The sitting president, Joe Biden, is still the steward of a U.S. economy and foreign policy at this tumultuous moment and may well bear ultimate responsibility for how they play out. But how Harris and Trump approach the three disparate issues could have a rippling impact on how Americans perceive their two choices this November.

“Unfortunately, there are going to be events like this, and this is where you see the leadership of a president show up,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters on Tuesday. “I think this should send a message to Americans: It matters. It matters who sits behind the Resolute Desk.”

Harris, with Biden's help, is trying to display steady calm as a flurry of difficult problems arise all at once.

She and Biden on Tuesday toggled between directing Hurricane Helene recovery and rescue response work and huddling with aides in the White House Situation Room to watch as the U.S. helped Israel defend against a massive attack by Iran in retaliation for the killing of Tehran-backed leaders of Lebanese Hezbollah.

All the while, they were keeping close contact with economic advisers as dockworkers took to the picket line Tuesday, a walkout stretching from ports in Maine to Texas that threatens to snarl supply chains and cause shortages and higher prices if it stretches on for more than a few weeks.

Trump, for his part, lashed out at Harris as in over her head, while claiming that this sort of crush of problems never would have happened under his watch.

“We have been talking about World War III, and I don’t want to make predictions,” Trump said at a campaign event in Wisconsin. “The whole world is laughing at us. That’s why Israel was under attack just a little while ago. Because they don’t respect our country anymore.”

Yet voters cast Trump aside four years ago in large part because of how they viewed his handling of the swirling economic, social and public health challenges that emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Biden, in comments to reporters before meeting with aides Tuesday to discuss the ongoing hurricane response, seemed to acknowledge the growing frustration with the federal response to the massive storm.

“I’ve been in frequent contact with the governors and other leaders in the impacted areas, and we have to jumpstart this recovery process,” Biden said. He traveled to the Carolinas on Wednesday to get a closer look at the hurricane devastation. He is also expected to visit hurricane-impacted areas in Georgia and Florida later this week. “People are scared to death. People wonder whether they’re going to make it.”

Harris, meanwhile, headed to Georgia on Wednesday and North Carolina in the coming days to do the same.

Tuesday's vice presidential debate offered a sampling of how the two campaigns were reacting to new developments to bolster their own messages and sharpen their attacks on their rivals. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz promised “steady leadership” under Harris while Ohio Sen. JD Vance pledged a return to “peace through strength” if Trump is returned to the White House.

Biden has stayed off the campaign trail since announcing in July that he was ending his reelection effort amid sliding public approval ratings.

His conspicuous absence underscores that Democrats see him as more of a liability than an asset in making the case for Harris, said Christopher Borick, director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion in Pennsylvania.

But how well Biden deals with the three latest emergency situations could have a big impact in how undecided voters perceive Harris in these final days.

“President Biden can't help Kamala Harris on the stump,” Borick said. “But in a campaign where you are turning over every rock in a few states to get that undecided voter, how he manages these crises over the next several weeks could have an impact.”

The Harris campaign understands the risks it faces with multiple crises converging all at once, especially given their varied and unpredictable nature. A prolonged strike, a bungled disaster response or a further expansion of the Middle East conflict could raise doubts about Biden's leadership, and by extension that of his second-in-command.

At the same time, Harris campaign aides believe the perilous moment presents an opportunity to demonstrate to voters the stakes of who’s in the job and the seriousness with which they approach it, according to campaign officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal thinking.

The former president, in a speech in Waunakee, Wisconsin, and in social media postings Tuesday, offered a mixture of prayer and concern for those impacted by Helene, jabs at Harris for the dockworkers strike, and an aside about the casting of Stanley Kubrick's film “Full Metal Jacket.”

“The situation should have never come to this and, had I been president, it would not have," Trump said in a statement about the strike.

Harris aides made a point of having the vice president deliver brief remarks on the Iranian attack Tuesday in between taping interviews for her campaign, aiming to portray her as ready to take command.

Late-term tumult has been a fixture in American presidential politics, sometimes in the form of scandal and other times with an incumbent hoping to demonstrate that he or his preferred successor would be a steady head at an uncertain time.

George W. Bush pushed a rescue package through Congress to stabilize a reeling financial system by creating the Troubled Asset Relief Program amid fears that the economy was on the verge of collapse. The broader economic conditions didn't help Republican John McCain in the race he lost to Barack Obama.

Jimmy Carter's reelection campaign in 1980 was paralyzed by the Iran hostage crisis. Fifty-two hostages were released on January 20, 1981, soon after his successor, Ronald Reagan, was inaugurated.

Lyndon Johnson announced a halting of bombings in North Vietnam days before the 1968 election, a step he hoped would bring the conflict toward a peace settlement. But the South Vietnamese indicated they would not negotiate and Johnson's vice president, Hubert Humphrey, lost narrowly to Republican Richard Nixon.

“The efforts by incumbents to help themselves or their party's nominee with ‘October surprises’ go back quite a ways,” said Edward Frantz, a University of Indianapolis historian. “In this current climate, I'm not sure how many voters can be persuaded by a candidate this late in the game trying to show competency.”

Beaumont reported from Des Moines, Iowa. AP writer Josh Boak contributed to this report.

In this combination of photos taken in Pennsylvania, Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign event, Aug. 18, 2024, in Rochester, left, and Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event, Aug. 19, 2024, in York. (AP Photo)