The Trump administration’s recent efforts to gut funding and personnel that support state and local election security efforts have left officials deeply concerned about their ability to guarantee physical and cyber security during the voting process.
This swift overhauling of funds means that states could lose access to information on emerging threats and election officials may be left without funding for key security services, which could leave certain states and localities more vulnerable to interference efforts than others.
“There is no difference between red states and blue states when it comes to concerns about election security, and no state can do this on their own,” said Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s programs for securing elections — everything from scanning election system networks for safety to sharing data with the public on potential threats — have been put on hold pending a review by the Department of Homeland Security, with no guarantee they will start up again.
Should support from CISA permanently lapse, states will be forced to come up with funding, and there’s no clear plan for how to do this nationwide, as election administration and processes vary from state to state.
“Withdrawing CISA’s support for local election officials will make elections less secure,” Schmidt warned in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem this month.
The lack of support from the cyber agency was further complicated this week when President Donald Trump signed an executive order that would completely overhaul the election process across the country and require DHS and the Election Assistance Commission — a federal organization that helps with election administration — to review the security of voting machines across the nation. It’s unclear how the agencies will carry this out, particularly with CISA support on hold.
The pullback in support — which includes personnel at CISA tasked with helping state officials secure voting systems and some funding for these efforts — stems in part from an assessment CISA conducted and recently sent to officials at DHS on the future of its election security programs. According to DHS officials, the review was finished in early March, but it won’t be made public….