Trump’s DHS Guts Task Forces Protecting Elections From Foreign Meddling

[GMDino]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-dhs-guts-task-forces-protecting-elections-from-foreign-meddling

I thought Rudy G was gonna handle all this?  

Quote:[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]Two teams of federal officials assembled to fight foreign election interference are being dramatically downsized, according to three current and former Department of Homeland Security officials. And now, those sources say they fear the department won’t prepare adequately for election threats in 2020.[/color]



[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“The clear assessment from the intelligence community is that 2020 is going to be the perfect storm,” said a DHS official familiar with the teams. “We know Russia is going to be engaged. Other state actors have seen the success of Russia and realize the value of disinformation operations. So it’s very curious why the task forces were demoted in the bureaucracy and the leadership has not committed resources to prepare for the 2020 election.”[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]The task forces, part of the Cyber Security and Infrastructure Agency (CISA), were assembled in response to Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. One focuses in part on securing election infrastructure and the other focuses on foreign influence efforts, including social media disinformation campaign.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]One of the task forces is now half the size it was a few months ago, according to two DHS officials familiar with the task forces, and there’s no indication that DHS senior political leadership will staff it up or sustain it. Instead, there are concerns it will completely wither away. The other task force also shrank significantly shortly after the midterms, according to that official, and before its members produced a thorough assessment of what happened during the 2018 elections.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“Our key allies are wondering why the U.S. is not more coordinated and not more proactive in dealing with this,” said the DHS official. “They don’t understand why the U.S. is not getting its act together.”[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]A DHS spokesperson confirmed that some people have been taken off the task forces and moved to other roles in the department. The spokesperson added that the department is bringing on new people to do election security work.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“As recently as this morning, Director Krebs confirmed election security remains a priority for CISA in his testimony before the House Committee on Homeland Security, laying out the Agency’s plan to work with State and local election officials on broader engagement, better defining risk to election systems, and understanding the resources to manage that risk,” said Sara Sendek, the DHS spokesperson.[/color]

[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“In the run up to the 2018 elections, DHS staffed the newly created elections task force and countering foreign influence task force by temporarily assigning personnel from across the Department. The work of these task forces continues to this day and is being institutionalized as a permanent effort. While some of the personnel who were brought on to serve on these task forces in temporary assignments have returned to their regular roles, we are also currently hiring new employees into permanent election positions to build out our team and support our efforts for 2020 and beyond,” Sendek added.[/color]

[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]One lawmaker with knowledge of the formation of CISA said the task forces were never intended to be permanent.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“In some sense it’s not surprising that these changes are happening,” he said. “There was nothing set in stone that said these teams were going to stay in formation. At least that was my understanding.”[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]Others said they found the change concerning.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“The Trump administration intelligence chiefs in their worldwide threat assessment clearly stated that the use of influence operations from countries like Russia, China and Iran poses a significant threat to the country,” said John Cohen, the former deputy undersecretary for intelligence and analysis at DHS. “If these reports are true, it’s highly disturbing that the department and the administration are not more focused on dealing with that threat.”[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]The election task force has worked to shield election infrastructure from foreign efforts to change vote counts. [/color]
[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]And the foreign influence task force is working to publicly reveal efforts by foreign actors to shape American political discourse on social media—in the hopes of significantly expanding Americans’ understanding of the threat. It was also designed to improve DHS’s coordination with foreign allies who face the same threat, and to help DHS better alert the private sector about threats.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]The changes to the task forces may make it harder for them to realize those goals, current and former officials say.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“It won’t be 2016 all over again—the threat is changing,” said a former DHS official. “A thinly staffed task force working on that is not going to be equipped to keep up with the adversary.”[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]A few weeks before President Donald Trump’s inauguration, then-DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson determined that DHS was responsible for helping protect election infrastructure—meaning polling places, voting machines, voter databases, and all the other components that make elections happen. The new, complex undertaking involved scores of state and local governments. A few years in, the department is still getting its footing. So the changes detailed here have people close to the department deeply concerned.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“Because it’s a very difficult task and because DHS has never done it before, there’s a lot of catching up to do,” said the former DHS official. “Even with a fully resourced effort, that would be an extremely tall task. But having it be deprioritized and lacking access to senior leadership, it’s virtually impossible.”[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]That said, these changes appear to reflect the White House’s lack of interest in beefing up election security, according to Paul Rosenzweig, formerly deputy assistant secretary for policy at DHS.[/color]


[color=rgba(2, 20, 31, 0.85)]“If the president isn’t interested and there is no strategy, it’s no surprise that DHS is not wasting its time,” said Rosenzweig, now a senior fellow at the R Street Institute. “The failure of the White House to take this seriously is perhaps its single most significant dereliction of duty.”[/color]

Maybe that was some other lie DJT told about caring about such things?  There are so many I get confused.

[Benton]

Not super surprising.

And a little off topic, but one thing slightly humorous about a small but vocal group of trump supporters is the belief that we need more proof of citizenship to prevent election fraud because non-citizen shouldn't have a say, while simultaneously saying it's ok for Russia to have had a say.

[Dill]

(02-15-2019, 11:06 AM)Benton Wrote: Not super surprising.

And a little off topic, but one thing slightly humorous about a small but vocal group of trump supporters is the belief that we need more proof of citizenship to prevent election fraud because non-citizen shouldn't have a say, while simultaneously saying it's ok for Russia to have had a say.

That's not really off topic. 

Both the election interference and voter fraud issues speak to the integrity of elections. 

In the former case, the attention of Trump supporters is directed away from a real problem and in the latter it is directed towards a faux one.

In both cases, it is extraordinary how much authority is invested in Trump's scrambled and contradictory claims alone, at the expense of entire institutions (FBI, CIA, Republican governorships) and public data.  

[Dill]

(02-15-2019, 10:25 AM)GMDino Wrote: Two teams of federal officials assembled to fight foreign election interference are being dramatically downsized, according to three current and former Department of Homeland Security officials. And now, those sources say they fear the department won’t prepare adequately for election threats in 2020

“It won’t be 2016 all over again—the threat is changing,” said a former DHS official. “A thinly staffed task force working on that is not going to be equipped to keep up with the adversary.”[/color]

“Even with a fully resourced effort, that would be an extremely tall task. But having it be deprioritized and lacking access to senior leadership, it’s virtually impossible.”

“Our key allies are wondering why the U.S. is not more coordinated and not more proactive in dealing with this,” said the DHS official. “They don’t understand why the U.S. is not getting its act together.”

I think we can get back to this once the border is secure.

In any case, a predictably fraudulent and contested election could be a hedge in presidential election for the party that knew it was coming and was uniquely equipped to exploit distrust in government institutions.  

Whose got Trump's back on this one?

[NATI BENGALS]

I need to add this to my other thread.
http://thebengalsboard.com/Thread-Steps-a-High-Ranking-Traitor-Would-Take