New York (AP) – When a video suspect of torn voting ballots in Pennsylvania drew attention to social networks last October, federal agencies responded quickly and called it Russian disinformation.
On the day of the November ballot, the threats of bomb against the polling stations in many states caused relatively few disturbances in the vote. It is one of the many scenarios covered by the country’s cybersecurity agency in its awareness of state and local officials.
The future of this assistance is now uncertain.
Reduction of the workforce and the dissolution of the Trump administration of federal agencies have launched efforts that improve election safety and monitored foreign influence. This could create shortcomings for American enemies to exploit the next time the country will hold a major election.
“Our opponents are increasing their game every day,” said former Cyber Chief-Chief of the Ministry of Internal Security, Suzanne Spaulding. “I fear that we are, at the same time, to demolish our defenses.”
Last week, the new Attorney General Pam Bondi dissolved an FBI working group focused on the study of foreign influence operations, including those that target the US elections. It has also limited the scope of the implementing measures for people who do not disclose lobbying in the name of foreign governments. She wrote that the changes “release free resources to combat more urgent priorities and put an end to the risks of weapons and abuse of the discretionary power of prosecution”.
The Trump administration has also made scanning discounts to the American cybersecurity and infrastructure agency, which oversees the country’s critical infrastructure, including electoral systems. On Saturday, a senior DHS official said that mass layoffs of federal employees in probationary status had resulted in discounts of more than 130 employees at the CISA. It was not immediately clear if these employees included 17 employees who had worked on the electoral security that had been on leave last week.
The manager of the DHS also said that the CISA had stopped all the electoral security activities pending an examination of their funding, its activities and its staff. The agency put an end to its involvement in a voluntary program that shared information on cyber-defenses with state and local electoral officials.
Actions send a message according to which the guarantee of the American elections against interference of countries such as Russia, China and Iran is no longer a priority of the federal government, said Larry Norden, electoral expert of the Brennan Center for Justice.
“I think we would be naive to think that the bad guys do not receive this message too, that there will be less cop on the pace to protect our elections,” he said.
States and local governments are organizing elections in the United States, but federal support in recent years has helped them protect themselves against escalation of threats, to coordinate with other electoral security offices and to exhibit Foreign influence campaigns designed to undermine the confidence of voters.
Los Angeles County Country Dean Logan recalled twice when the federal government was the first to be aware of a threat to his office. In 2023, federal officials warned of a suspicious envelope heading enough of its electoral facilities enough to be intercepted. In 2024, the federal government informed him of a threat of bomb sent by email to his office before he knows it.
“We cannot be eyes and ears to see everything,” said Logan. “We focus on the administration of the elections.”
There are certain elements of this work that only the FBI can do, said Darren Linvill, co -director of the Clemson University Media Center, who investigated the Malignant Influence campaigns in 2024. He said that The FBI working group “will be missed in 2026 and beyond.”
The main democrats of the Senate and the committees of the Chamber supervising electoral legislation wrote a letter last week to the main CISA leaders to express a “serious concern” concerning changes and request more information on how these changes will affect election safety.
Trump sought to stop the government’s monitoring of online disinformation, which he compared to censorship targeting conservatives. Although Trump signed the bill to create the CISA in 2018, he dismissed his director, Christopher Krebs, following the 2020 elections that Trump lost against Democrat Joe Biden. Krebs had guaranteed the security of the vote when Trump continued to claim that she had been rigged.
Biden administration adopted the government’s monitoring of foreign influence and frequently alerted the public with these operations in 2024. An FBI investigation also led to the indictment of three Iranian agents to hack the campaign of Trump.
The FBI worked in close collaboration with CISA and the office of the national intelligence director in the coordination of information on foreign influence operations, the efforts carried out by the ODNI foreign malignant center of influence.
Trump’s new national information director Tulsi Gabbard has not shared his plans for the center, which was authorized by the Congress and should expire at the agency’s discretion in 2028. armament and politicization ”of the intelligence community.
There is no indication that the Ministry of Justice plans to stop investigating crimes related to spying linked to electoral interference. But the evisition of a working group devoted to this mission still has an impact, said David Salvo, director general of the Alliance for the Democracy of the Marshall German Fund.
“I’m sure there are still officers at the FBI who probably look at this activity in some ways,” he said. “But I am not convinced that political masters care so much, and it is possible that these officers are invited to stop this work entirely.”
Some Republicans have congratulated the abolition of the working group. Senator Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who heads the Senate judicial committee, said on the social platform X that unit was “very politicized” and that the closure was the “good decision”.
In a statement sent by email, the FBI recognized that the working group had been dissolved but said that it would not comment on “specific staff actions”.
As for the CISA, whose broader mission is to protect the critical infrastructure of America, the future is not clear. Trump’s republican allies criticized the agency for his work to fight against COVVI-19 disinformation and the 2020 elections. The secretary of internal security, Kristi Noem, said during his confirmation audience of the Senate that She had moved away from “distant mission”.
DHS assistant secretary, Tricia McLaughlin, confirmed in an email last week that employees were on leave and said that the agency assessed “how it had executed its electoral security mission with particular accent on all work linked to bad, say and malinformation ”. DHS said on Saturday that the part of its exam was completed and that the agency took “appropriate measures” concerning these employees.
In the midst of federally uncertainty, Washington Secretary of State Steve Hobbs said that he urged the legislator to finance electoral security programs. Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said that Trump could restructure the federal government as he wishes, his state depends on the CISA electoral services.
“I am not too concerned about the supply of the agency, but we must have them,” he said.
___
Cassidy reported to San Diego.
___
The Associated Press receives the support of several private foundations to improve its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. Find out more about the AP democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
