Thursday, March 7, 2024

Homeland Security and U.S. Election Faith | TOME

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Now that the party nominees for president have all but been decided, America’s entire election infrastructure is under assault, from foreign governments, hackers, and extremists. Or at least that’s the frenzied message being conveyed from on high these days. Russian warning lights are flashing. Think tanks are working overtime to grind out panicked reports about cybersecurity and disinformation. Fearmongering proliferates on both sides of the political aisle.

Federal Government’s Zeal to Protect Elections

The federal government is most active in this effort, and in its zeal to “protect” the elections, Washington is building a narrative that achieves exactly what it blames foreign adversaries for. By arguing that the elections can and will be manipulated, federal agencies are delegitimizing the highly effective and secure electoral system, and affirming the view of too many Americans that the vote can’t be trusted.

Polling shows that conservative voters continue to be distrustful of America’s electoral system. The opinion of the electorate at large is murkier to assess, but some Democrats have also waded into the election denialism.

FBI’s Testimony and Conflation of Threats

Last month, FBI Director Christopher Wray testified before Congress that election interference is a major priority in the coming months. As evidence of the Bureau’s work on the issue, Wray cited an FBI investigation into two Iranian hackers who had used voter rolls to disseminate misinformation about illegal ballots being cast overseas.

In his testimony, Wray conflates the threat posed by cyber attacks with targeted disinformation campaigns. There is abundant evidence that foreign governments like Russia engaged in efforts to influence the 2016 and 2020 elections. But there are no examples of successful cyber attacks on the election system itself.

Recent Reports on Election Security

More recently, the FBI, Justice Department, and the Department of Homeland Security reported in late December that despite incessant hand-wringing over election security, foreign adversaries had no impact on the 2022 midterm elections. This week, they reported that there were no credible threats against Super Tuesday’s primary election.

The federal government seems intent on conveying the message that the electoral system is vulnerable, despite the fact that the highly distributed state and local electoral system — protected in part by its decentralization and diversity — inherently makes it resilient and overall invulnerable. Michael Cornfield, an associate professor at George Washington University’s Graduate School of Political Management told CBC: “The chances that the actual ballot tabulation could be hacked are next to nothing. … It’s almost impossible.”

Conclusion

The federal government’s argument is that Russia and China (and even Iran) — through “malign influence” — are clandestinely seeking to undermine American’s faith in elections and even damage American democracy. Acceptance of this proposition, and the belief that “they” are succeeding, is central to the federal government’s larger effort to combat disinformation. For local election officials, the only solution on tap from Washington is offering to supply secret “intelligence.”

To deal with protecting the vote itself against interference or manipulation, the federal government has been offering cybersecurity “hygiene” audits of state and local systems, while employing the National Security Agency and the military’s Cyber Command to thwart any incoming electronic attacks. While “election security” makes sense on the surface, the overall effect, particularly as the bureaucrats push greater centralization and standardized machines and procedures, is that it might actually increase the vulnerability of a system that is already secure because of its very decentralization and variety.

None of this directly addresses “malign influence” or the vitality of American democracy, neither of which are solvable by government efforts to restrict information. And by increasingly doling out security clearances to state and local officials so that they can get “intelligence” on foreign influence efforts, the federal government enlists election officials into a bifurcated public and secret world, one that undermines transparency and consequently lessens public confidence.

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