Transcripts For CSPAN3 House Judiciary Committee Hearing On Election Security 20240713

Officials. The house judiciary hearing runs about two and a half hours. The committee on judiciary welcomthe judiciarywill come to. Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare recess of the committee at any time. We welcome everyone thi to this mornings hearing on securing americans election part two oversight of Government Agencies. I will now recognize myself for an Opening Statement. Last month this Committee Held apart one of the series of hearings on securing americas elections. In that hearing, three witnesses have been jointly selected by the committee testified unequivocally that the nations elections are under attack. The former director on the National Security council under both president clinton and president george w. Bush warned we must take bold, decisive and expeditious steps to address the Cyber Threats. We must treat elections activity as an imperative for safeguarding our democracy. Secretary of state from the commonwealth of pennsylvania and moderated elections activity is a race without a finish line and our adversaries are not slowing down. This testimony has been confirmed by the leaders of our Intelligence Community. Last month the director of National Intelligence testified about the foreign actors wouldve viewed by 2020 u. S. Elections as an opportunity to advance their interest. We expect them to refine the capabilities and a new tactics as they learn from each others experiences and efforts in the previous elections and in short there is no question they are the cornerstone of the free and Democratic Society are exposed. Protecting the nations democratic process from before an attack must be among the top priority is. And we are committed to doing the work. Today we have representatives from the four federal agencies leading the charge on election committee. The department of Homeland Security, the federal bureau of investigation by the department of justice and the Election Assistance Committee commission, im sorry. At the core, they are run at the state and local level. But the federal government must provide critical support to both the states to defend themselves from hostile foreign actors. Protecting our elections requires a whole of Society Approach that relies on coordinated actions by Government Agencies at all levels including the agencies represented here today. Federal agencies responsible for protecting the elections have made significant progress since 2016. These efforts are important and commendable, but significant vulnerabilities in the system remain. To start, our efforts must be integrated and coordinated. A simple search of report Election Security issues turns up results for over 20 different groups across the agencies and others. These agencies and others. There must be clear lines of authority to ensure the states know which of the multiple programs across the agencies is in charge. Equally important, we must do more to ensure better federal and state collaboration that requires earning the trust of the states. At a public speech october 3, 2018, dhs director explained that in 2016 when the federal government called for state officials to avert the threats, there was as he said, no trust and no certainty or confidence in the ability of the federal government. One way to strengthen trust is to enhance transparency. In 2016 the specific intent was not initially made public. Today we can do better if we can educate state and local officials and the public about influence operations by bringing our adversaries tactics to light we can prevent them from succeeding. In addition, we must ensure that the development and maintenance of the system matches the nature of the Cyber Threats. For example, current federal guidelines for the certification process was created in 2005 and are woefully out of date. And mr. Byrd of microsoft testified last month the process is more than a decade old, and it is too slow and too burdensome to enable them to respond as quickly as needed to our agile adversaries. Finally, most importantly, we must ensure that the state and local officials are the frontline defenders of democracy and thought the resources and support they need to protect the systems. Dhs has made it clear that it requires Additional Resources to fulfill the task. Its requested them to help the state in anticipation of the 2020 cycle. May 152019, they testified before the senate that the u. S. Currently lacks sufficient funding in critical areas to protect over 2020 election. Unfortunately, however, President Trump and the Administration Rather than listening to the warnings of the federal agencies about the seriousness of the threat picture and request for more resources to secure has done the opposite. The Trump Administration has cut the senior cyber positions downsized by half the Security Team and proposed a significant budget cuts to the phs major Election Security programs. All of these actions leave us more vulnerable to the ongoing threat to our democracy. We will not let this happen. Elections cannot be a partisan issue. They must be an american issue. This committee is committed to working together to protect our democracy from all threats to our elections in all forms, brother to the physical election infrastructure or the ongoing disinformation campaigns coming from adversaries like russia. I think each of the witnesses for being here today. My colleagues and i are looking forward to hearing your testimony about your ongoing efforts to secure our elections and important work remains to be done. Without objection, the Ranking Members statement will be placed in the record and all other Opening Statement be included in the record. I will now introduce todays witnesses. Matt masterson is the senior Cyber Security advisor at the department of Homeland Security where he manages election securitthe electionsecurity undl Protection Program director at 12014 to 2018 he serves as the u. S. Election Assistance Commission or. Prior to his appointment, he served as an interim chief of staff for the ohio secretary of state, deputy chief Information Officer and Deputy Director of election. He received his bs from Miami University in oxford ohio and a jd from the university of Dayton School of law. Mickey is the Deputy Assistant director of the Counterintelligence Division of the fbi where she oversees the Intelligence Branch which includes both foreign and foreign. Code task force system. She entered the bureau in 2005 as an Intelligence Analyst observed in many other positions including Deputy Assistant director of operations in the counterterrorism division. He oversaw terrorism, financing operations, strategic operations headcount ever do some analysis area she has a bachelors degree in psychology from the university of rhode island and a masters degree in criminology from George Washington university. Adam hake is a Deputy Assistant attorney general of the National Security division at the department of justice. In that role he manages the divisions efforts to combat National Security threats including threats to the election system. Before joining the department of justice, he clerked for a judge of the u. S. District court for the Southern District of new york and judge rober the judge r the court of appeals for the second circuit. He received his bachelors degree from Harvard College and a jd from yale law school. The vice chair of the election Assistance Commission was the designated federal officer for the Technical Guidelines Development Committee which developed the voluntary Voting System guidelines before being appointed vice chair, the commissioner served as the acting chief counsel for the u. S. Senate committee on rules and administration. The commission received his ba from the university of Central Arkansas and a jd from the university of oregon. Please note each of your return statements will be entered into the record in its entirety. Accordingly, i ask that you summarize your testimony in five minutes to help you stay within that time there is a timing light on your table. When the light switches from green to yellow, you have one minute to conclude your testimony. When the light turns red signals your five minutes has expired. They want to thank you all for participating in todays hearing. If you would please rise i will begin by swearing un. Do you swear or affirm under penalty of perjury that the testimony you are about to give uis true and correct the best of your knowledge, information and belief, so help you god . You may be seated. Let the record reflect the witnesses show the witnesses have answered in the affirmati affirmative. Mr. Masterson, you may begin and you will have to push the button to turn the microphone on before you start. Thank you. Thank you and good morning members of the committee. Thank you for this opportunity to testify regarding the Cyber Security and infrastructure Security Agencys efforts to help secure the election infrastructure across the country. My name is matt masterson, believed and former chair of the u. S. Election Assistance Commission as well as Election Officials in the state of ohio. We have a strong relationship with our federal partners seeded here at the table and with state and local Election Officials across the country. Our election late admission is clear. To support officials and their privatesector part is and identify and manage risk systems. They are run at the state level by dedicated professionals across americas more than 8,800 election jurisdictions and the work to ensure those officials dont have to defend themselves from sophisticated and persistent threats on their own. Over the last three years we have worked tirelessly to strengthen our partnership with the community. We already provide free voluntary resources and all 50 states over 2100 locally and territorial jurisdictions of the six election associations come up with Technology Providers and political organizations including president ial campaigns. Our approach has been and continues to be threefold. One, making sure that the community has the information they needed and systems rated number two, making sure they have the Technical Support and tools to identify and mitigate risk to the infrastructure and number three, building and partnerships to advance the efforts together. We are laser focused on building a scalable, repeatable mechanisms to dramatically grow the information sharing capabilities. We share the contextualized threat analysis and information through our close partnerships with the Intelligence Community, Law Enforcement and private sector. More importantly, state and local officials are sharing what they see on their networks with us. We deployed the intrusion Detection Capabilities or alberta sensors to provide realtime Detection Capabilities of malicious activity on election infrastructure in all 50 states. Second, we provide Technical Support and services to officials and vendors and refine our understanding of the officials needs we are shifting to the capabilities that are quicker, less intrusive and can scale to more jurisdictions. For instance in 2018 and 2019 we deployed a remote Penetration Testing capability thanks in part to the funding provided by congress. This remote Penetration Testing capability allows us to identify, risk older abilities to the Network Connected systems without having to deploy teams of the local offices and without interrupting both of their time and people. Weve also been working closely with election Technology Providers to ensure that the systems and other technologies undergo testing to discover and fix vulnerabilities in the software. The scalability is critical because while our initial efforts in 2016 were clearly targeted at the state Election Officials we recognize the need to increase the support to the counties and municipalities who operates the elections. For example, the last Mile Initiative provides nocost information sharing tailored to those jurisdictions to identify the cyber risk to the infrastructure and checklist of action items to mitigate the risk. The final area of focus has been building on the partnerships to our collective defense. And it may seem mundane and that the government, communication, coordination and training and planning are the Critical Foundation elements of our efforts to secure the nations elections. On the cycle, theyve built of the Lessons Learned for the 2018 election and is extending the work to prioritized the following lines of effort. Once an extended engagement at the local Election Officials. We continue to work with officials to improve both bears and our understanding of this assistance. For instance june of this year we did our second table top vote exercise where 47 states, thousands of local officials, private sector and federal fedel governments Work Together through scenarios to share information and understand how we would all collectively respond to threats to the election infrastructure. With a better understanding of risk we can identify and provide the resources they needed to secure the systems. Weve expanded the level of engagement and sharing of the Cyber Security practices with political organizations as well including the dnc and the rnc. This is joined in offering greetings to the president ial campaigns to register and has engaged directly with campaigns to offer our services. In coordination with our inner Agency Partners with committed to helping americans recognize and avoid the foreign disinformation operations impacting the elections through innovative efforts like our war on pain of a campaign where we educated americans on the tactics of ford and influence continues in a topic everyone can relate to, the divisive issue of pineapple on pizza. We will continue to put out educational material to build resilience in th of the American Public on the foreign influence operation. Finally, we are working closely with our Intelligence Community and the private sector to increase the quantity, quality and timeliness of intelligence analysis and production of the unclassified levels to help Election Officials in the public identify and expose the foreign influence operations. We are committed to working with congress to ensure our efforts to cultivate a safe or secure resilient homeland and once again thank you for the opportunity to appear before the committee and i look forward to your questions. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you and good morning, members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the fbi efforts to secure americas election. As you just heard in the Deputy Assistant director for the fbi Counterintelligence Division. The fbi is the lead for identifying and combating the maligned foreign influence operations that target the Democratic Institutions and values. This also includes the investigation of election related cyber intrusion of crime. In order to achieve the strategic geopolitical objectives, the foreign adversaries using aligned influence operation to shift the u. S. Policy and the Political Sentiment in this course undermined confidence in the u. S. Democratic institutions and values that interfere with the electoral processes. This widely reported these days of the cubs bwith the cubs by tn adversaries to discredit the individuals and technicians through the use of false personas and fabricated stories on social media platforms. These operations have aimed to spread disinformation so civil discourse and also undermine the confidence in our Democratic Institutions and values. One influence operation involves a wide spectrum of activity. However it is subversive and declared a criminal and coercive aspect of these activities that form the basis of the fbi investigative interest. Its widely talked about in the maligned foreign influence. This is by no means a new problem. However, the interconnectedness and online anonymity have changed the character of the sworn influence and have the fbi and its partners must address it. In my role at the fb of the fbig the task force would we call in the fall of 2017 the director established to conduct foreign influence operations targeting the United States. The citizens led by the Counterintelligence Division and comprised of agents, analysts and professional staff from the counterintelligence, Counterterrorism Center and criminal investigative division. Opening the 2018 midterm elections the fbi expanded the scope of the senate. Previously the efforts were focused on the threat posed by russia. However, we now have units working to combine the operations not just from russia but also from china, iran and other global adversaries. We have refined and focused strategy. The fbi takes this approach to address the serious threat. The first part focuses on the investigations and operations and the 56 field offices to open investigations with the foreign influence texas. You might think of it with fbi field offices and personnel as they spoke. Investigative approach seeks to impose the cost of our adversaries specifically the key influencers and enablers. Investigations of the cyber nexus over collaboratively in the division in the Cyber Task Force is. This way the fbi can quickly respond to those parts of the infrastructure. Moreover, the Fbi Cyber Division works closely with u. S. Intelligence committees work to determine the attribution. The second is on information and intelligence sharing. The fbi works closely with our fellow Intelligence Community agencies as well as state and local Law Enforcement partners and Election Officials to share intelligence to detect and detour our adversaries. In 2018 the effort led the creation of the protective devices the joint initiative between the fbi, department of justice, department of Homeland Security, secret service and the odni. We developed a series of videos to help the political campaigns better understand this threat and made them available for the fbis public website. In the past months weve expanded the protective voices providing webinars and inperson briefings to the president ial campaigns on slavery and maligned influence threats. Currently we are expanding the audience including the congressional campaigns and the general public. We collaborate extensively with the u. S. Government partners to provide information to the state and local government officials, vendors and social Media Companies so that they can put their system against cyber attacks. Collaboration of the common understanding of the landscape. The last part is the private sector partnership, Technology Companies have a frontline responsibility to secure their own networks, products and platforms. We are doing our part by providing the intelligence to better enable them to address the platforms that the foreign actors. The fbi established the relationships in the Technology Social Media Companies and maintains an ongoing dialog to enable the Rapid Exchange of the threat information. Across all of these, the fbi is constantly receiving the effectiveness of the coordination and outreach. To our knowledge no Foreign Government has attempted to tamper with accounts. However, even doubts about whether it has occurred can be damaging but we know our adversaries are trying to influence the processes and outcomes in advance of the 2020 election. While focuses on the security, i want to note that they seek to influence National Policies and Public Opinion in important ways beyond just elections. We look forward to continuing this important work and appreciate the support of the committee. Thank you again for the opportunity to appear before you today and i am happy to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you very much. Good morning distinguished members of the committee and thank you for the opportunity to testify today on behalf of the Justice Department concerning our efforts to ensure the safety and security of the nations election infrastructure and to combat the foreign influence. The maligned foreign influence i am referring to the covert actions by Foreign Government intended to affect u. S. Political sentiment in Public Discourse through divisions in our society would undermine confidence in our Democratic Institutions and these can range from computer hacking that target this election infrastructure or Political Parties to statesponsored media campaigns. This issue, protecting the nations democratic processes has been and remains a top priority of the department. Our principal role here is the investigation and prosecution of the federal crimes. But the maligned foreign influence efforts extend beyond efforts to interfere with elections and require more than Law Enforcement responses alone. Recognizing that, w we approach this National Security threat the same as any other. By using our own legal tools as well as supporting the tools and authorities of others and to the best of our ability we try to prevent crimes from occurring or disrupt them and progress in part by sharing information with people and institutions to allow them to better protect themselves. Reflecting the priority of these issues last year the attorney general Cyber Digital Task force analyzed the types of foreign influence operations and laid out a framework to guide our responses and since the election, we have taken a number of steps to combat the maligned foreign influence and support for secure elections. First, as an Intelligence Driven organization and member of the community, the fbi pursues tips and leads including from the classified information to identify and investigate and disrupt the illegal foreign influence activities and to that end as already explained, theyve now got the foreign influence was forced to leave the response to ensure information flow, resource allocation and coordination within the department and among the department of the federal partners in the private sector. Second, together with other agencies through the series of outreach and education efforts have been Holding Public helpinc officials, candidates and social Media Companies to harden their own networks and platforms against the maligned foreign influence operations. Third, we have improved enforcement of the Foreign Agents registration act, one of the statutory tools defaults ensured transparency and the activities of the foreign entities and the gerbils. The effect makes it more difficult for those entities and individuals to hide the role and activities occurring within the United States. Forthcoming of our investigations have led to a number of criminal charges and other Enforcement Actions that have exposed the maligned influence efforts by the foreign states and their proxies. While we work with other nations to obtain custody of the foreign defendants whenever possible, just the charges themselve themp educate the American Public about the threats that we face. This can our investigations have supported the actions of other u. S. Government agencies such as financial sanctions imposed by the secretary of the treasury. Finally, even outside of the context of criminal charges, we have used the information from our investigations both to warren and reassure the potential victims and the general public alike about the maligned foreign influence activities. Now the victim notifications for defensive countenotification tor Intelligence Briefings and Public Safety announcements are Traditional Department activities. But they must be conducted of particular sensitivity in the context of the elections and in some circumstances exposure can be counterproductive or otherwise improve and. Given the countervailing considerations, the department has adopted a Public Policy for evaluating whether and how to disclose the maligned foreign influence activities and among its First Principles of the partisan Political Considerations must play no role in our decisions. Our adversaries will undoubtedly change their tactics and we will need to be nimble in our. But the framework we have developed to respond will have staying power and as you can see, the department plays an Important Role in combating the foreign efforts to interfere. But there are limits to the role and that of the federal government as a whole combating the maligned foreign influence requires the whole of Society Approach and relies on the coordinated actions by Government Agencies at various levels. Support from the private sector and active engagement of an informed public. Thank you again and i look forward to your question. Thank you very much. Good morning members of the committee, i thank you for the opportunity to testify before you this morning to detail the work of the u. S. Election Assistance Commission better known as the eac to fulfill its missions and help america vote act. I also appreciate this opportunity to highlight the great work of the state state ad local Election Officials around the country. As you know the nations elections are run at the state and local level with each of the 50 states and u. S. Territories running elections in different ways. Officials in over a thousand loca8,000 localjurisdictions ary responsible for conducting our elections and their work truly protects and ensures the most fundamental pillar of our democracies of the vote. Since 2016 theres been an enormous increase in focus on the security which is just one of the many responsibilities Election Officials must address. Im pleased to report from my Vantage Point at the community has responded in an aggressive fashion considering the challenges we face. Nearly every conference i attend while traveling around the country has a substantial focus on security and protecting the integrity of elections is a constant topic in meetings with election administrators, federal partners and external stakeholders. Even so, we need to ask ourselves the key question will that be enough if the officials do not have a substantial resources they need to defend our democracy against potential threats . The good news is the department of Homeland Security designation of election infrastructure Critical Infrastructure there has been a change in information sharing between the federal government and state and local officials. This includes the creation of the Government Coordinating Council which brings together state and local officials, federal partners as well as the coordinating council which has helped organize private sector vendors and nonprofit entities that support local Election Officials. Weve also seen the creation of the infrastructure information and sharing and Analysis Center which now has over 2100 members including every state officials office. The deployment of the monitors hardening of the systems increased training and promotion exercises around the cyber events evolve exponentially increased since 2016. The 2018 appropriation of 380 million of funding which was distributed in most of its obligation has largely contributed to these improvements. It doesnt cover everything the official stated that the states would have the ability to essentially choose from a menu of reforms and improvements in the priority is the code address the most pressing needs and vulnerabilities. As the chairwoman testified earlier this year, the project 85 of the 2018 money will be spent in advance of 2020. We have seen some states use the funding to replace aging or paperless equipment and other states have replaced the statewide Voter Registration databases or added additional security measures like multifactor authentication. Some have posted a training and a tabletop exercises ahead of 2022 dead in Election Officials a handson experience that can help them prepare for various threats. One of my personal favorite uses of the fy 2018 funding is the implementation of the cyber navigated programs. Essentially the state recognizes that many local jurisdictions do not have the capacity or the need for the fulltime election Cyber Security experts of the state employs individuals with regional responsibilities and they provide Technical Assistance to several counties on the disabilities. This is the kind of Innovative Program that will help bolster the Cyber Security defenses and improve how the states conduct elections. Its also a model that they would like to amplify nationwide should the funding support such an effort. Unfortunately not all of the news is good. As you know the threat of the foreign adversaries remains real and ultimately state and local officials do not have the resources to support a truly determined sophisticated state actor. This is why we must take action to build resilience here at home and implement policies that the two are the adversaries of opposition is a real sanctions regime. Additional funding is crucial to allow the states to continue to make necessary improvements that increase the strength and resiliency of our election systems. When we talk about Election Administrations, we are talking about the infrastructure of our democracy. To make meaningful and lasting change requires the investment over time and it cannot just be about 2020 or anyone election but about all of them going forward. During the Senate Rules Committee in may i share the recent discovery that the operating budget of 7. 95 million is less than the amount kansas city spends on potholes. Its startling to think of one city with a population of around 500,000 people invest more to protect its residents car tires and alignment than the country invests in the only federal agency dedicated to completely improve Election Administration at helping more than 200 million registered voters cast their ballot. Thank you for your time and i am happy to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you. Witnesses, we will ask unanimous consent that my Opening Statement is entered into the record and without objection, under the fiveminute rule i will begin by recognizing myself for five minutes and let me before i start to think the vice chair of the committee for resizing while i was testifying in another kennedy. In 2016, but elections were hacked in three years later the community is universally confirmed for an actors have redoubled their efforts and are preparing to attack on the 2020 elections. If the president has blocked security efforts and cut the programs designed to safeguard, for example they issued instructions not to mention the Election Security. The president also disbanded the commission on the integrity and eliminated the cybersecurity coordinator on the Security Council and dramatically downsized the two teams fighting for the interference. The 20 budget for the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency even further. The president is handicapping the agencies and securing our elections. In the latest midterm elections it comes from the president himself, the foreign leaders interfered and this isnt the first time. The 2016, president of trump than the candidate encourage russia to illegally hack the adversaries emails. This past june President Trumps and information on his adversary and 2020 from a Foreign Government and justice by President Trump publicly suggested, quote, china should start an investigation into biden. To be clear it is unacceptable to ask the foreign adversaries to interfere in any way in americas elections. If we ask others to interfere, if we undermine the publics confidence in the integrity of the voting process we are doing our adversaries work for them. We cant continue to undermine our own values on the world stage. The president s own officials agree. The ambassadors with me state clearly inviting them to undertake in the purpose of influencing an upcoming election would be wrong. Each of you sitting here today responsible for protecting the integrity of and Public Confidence in our elections i would like to hear from each of you in turn, yes or no do you think it is appropriate for the president of the United States to ask a Foreign Government to investigate his political opponent in a 2020 election . Yes or no . No. No sir. Im not going to comment on the president s activities, but we are committed to confronting the violations. To ask to investigate opponents. It im focused on enforcing the criminal law. No. Thank you. The report concluded that at approximately june 16, im sorry, quote, approximately june, 2016, the Russian Intelligence Organization compromised Computer Network of the Illinois State board of elections and gained access to the database containing information on the millions of registered voters. The report confirms that the Russian Hackers successfully breached the databases and was found to alter or delete the voting records. Last month i as asked our expert witnesses of the impact if they had been able to alter the databases. The director of the National Security council under president s bush and clinton testified about altering the databases would have been, quote, devastating including because tens of thousands of voters could have been turned away at the polls. The Intelligence Community has confirmed the threat of this happening again is very real. Its made it harder for the federal agencies to do their job to keep our democratic processes. Processes. Indeed the white house has intentionally cut the budget and staff going into an election on the Intelligence Community has confirmed that the biggest threat to the nation has seen a. Like our tabletop to exercise. When or if they identify that information and with the federal government what they have in place to respond there is infinite response capabilities for teams that can support Election Officials in anticipation of reporting of incidents. In addition we are looking for state and local elections to have in place a provisional ballot if there is an issue with the voter rolls they are prepared to administer broadly to make sure every voter has the ability to know the vote was counted as cast. So now that ability should that large county and then that we dont have a long postelection excuse over a couple of thousand votes quick. The level of funding with a 33 million of last year and the proposed funding now allows us to maintain that level of support in order to ensure that from election day. The gentleman from ohio. We wasted so much time on bogus russian collusion investigation and now these that will not go anywhere its nice that we actually have the department of justice and Homeland Security and the fbi and us election Assistance Commission before us to talk about a real issue which is protecting americas elections there are various pieces of legislation to better protect our elections in the future of original cosponsor of hr 3442 that denies entry into the United States an individual that interferes with our election. And maybe we could Work Together in a bipartisan fashion with this committee that we are the Gold Standard of what the rest of the world looks to. We had then that Gold Standard so i will ask by starting with the legislation that i just mentioned. What is the standard for determining what type of content posted by Foreign Agents that rises to the level of being a foreign influence . Is there a certain type of herbage or rhetoric the fbi looks for . And do you think engaging in such behavior online should be considered with United States quick. The fbi does not content or Police Information on the internet. That is certainly not our job. That what we look at is known of various actors and we have identified a foreign actor who is participating and is part of the operation seek to propagate the information or post derogatory content that is investigative interest but we do not start with content and work our way back. Do you agree with that. No. Thats right. We focus on known actors and tips from providers in a way that helps them make determinations of their terms of service. Is anything different of justice is doing to work with social media in advance of the elections quick. We support the efforts and sometimes work with providers. Are there any countries other than russia you have seen or you believe is showing some interest in disrupting our elections in 2020 or in the future in general quick. We have spoken about foreign influence activities from china and we are certainly concerned about others perk obviously we have seen actions by other nations like turkey and ukraine. To any witness, what was your agencys role to secure the 2018 congressional midterm elections and what specific efforts were made quick. Our role as it is now helping to secure the 2018 midterm elections was to provide information sharing support services to officials to help them manage risk to their systems. We started by building the relationships with state Election Officials that are appropriately skeptical of the federal loan loan role in elections and the information we provided services help them to identify risk to their system so we are doubling down on efforts to reach across the state how do we get the information sharing she needs to manage risk quick. I am close to being out of time but would you agree the fbis reputation was significantly damaged by political bias against President Trump specifically exhibited by a number of top level officials from your organization quick. s or i will not comment on any damage or lack of damage to our reputation. I will answer it. It really was like peter struck and others pretty much damaged it it is unfair to the rest of your organization because you are truly a Great Organization one of the best in the nation. I yield back. For the record i think peter struck worked in the highest level. Thank you to all the witnesses not only for your testimony and your service to our country it is recognized and appreciated. Just a note to the gentle man from ohio the bill that he has cosponsor there is some variations about denying pieces to those who are interfering in our elections. That will be made part of the shield act through the managers amendment and i just wanted him to know that that we are taking a good idea and moving it forward. The Mueller Report describes evidence that the then Trump Campaign chairman Paul Manafort talk to the russian operative of a strategy for winning democratic votes in midwestern states and internal polling data of the campaign which i always thought what was going on . Why the internal polling data to the rushing age one russian agent . I would ask you to comment but generically, why would a campaign see in turn all data for the battleground states to be helpful to someone seeking to impact our elections and specifically what a hostile actor do with such information with any campaign if they got internal polling data quick. Thank you for the question. Looking at china or russia they take a whole government approach with foreign influence not just federal elected officials but state and local elected officials as well because anyone can influence policy moving forward. So because they take a whole government approach any bit of information can help inform their decision how to move forward with their operation so on the surface it may not seem like a great benefit but china and russia uses every tool in the toolbox to get all information they seem valuable. If we were candidates one of the things we know is that if you are interested in polling data you could not do a poll without being caught. The only way you get this information is from a campaign that was legitimately done. A report this month was released by the Senate Intelligence committee on russian interference with our elections and it said the russian government use geographic targeting features to reach audiences in specific locations and in 25 percent of the ads purchased were targeted down to state or city or University Level in michigan and wisconsin they were targeted with advertisements overwhelmingly focused on the subject of Police Brutality to move populations in one direction or another. If a campaign made its information such as polling data are readily available to a Foreign Government and then used it to target the voters through social media is that something the department of justice would investigate . Or is there a law that would allow or stimulate an investigation spent there are two parts i dont know if Campaign Finance of the statutes would apply with respect to National Security statutes i am familiar with a focus if an american is acting as an agent of a Foreign Government under the direction or control of the Foreign Government. In that example it is the reverse of that if they are directly in control or procuring from the government. I will note we will have an opportunity in the near future to make this much clearer by approving the shield act which would prohibit the sharing of internal data by an American Campaign from a foreign power so you have a very clear basis to proceed on that. I hope we can get a strong bipartisan support for that measure. With that my time is expired i yield back. The gentleman from arizona. Thank you. I would love to spend this time talking about Election Security. It is critical. Im prepared to ask those questions but we come to this hearings and it is impeachment all the time. This committee we were told by the chairman but here we sit if you want to ask the questions or mischaracterize a conversation then go get into the closed hearing downstairs but you cannot get in because i tried. So when i hear the chairman open up the Opening Statement about the ukrainian phone call and suggest the president asked the ukrainian president to interfere in the 2020 election you can characterize it anyway you want to but i would suggest that is not the proper characterization. Talk about ukrainian interference in the 2016 election that is what President Trump was asking president zelensky look into. Now with biden here is my question doj, fbi, do you think a person who has admitted criminal conduct should have immunity from investigation . Because they are potential political opponent in the upcoming election . What do you think . I think nations should follow facts and law where they lead with criminal investigations speak in. Regardless of their potential candidate or not quick. Without fear or favor. The other thing that was suggested is if i ask questions and the chairman doesnt like the responses with the statement that i make, when i am done he will offer his comment. Thats when he said peter struck was representing the highest ideals were highest standards of the agency. That is highly unusual normal if you want to make that comment he asked to have somebody else yield that time to him so he can rebut that comment but that happens perpetually here because it is convenient. On the chairman i can do whatever i want. But i would suggest to you i do think mister struck is exactly the opposite. His misconduct actually reflected poorly and has caused Much Division and heartache in this country. And thats just the way it is. We focus a lot on russian interference of the 2016 election the maligned influence of the russians. Are there other nationstates that have engaged in 2016 from the 2020 elections . The one big country we are focused on outside of russia is china. Make no mistake china is aggressively pursuing aggressive influence they do a different tactic they prefer interaction in these economic levers is to see the Global Economic superpower so as we go towards 2020 russia certainly is a threat in 2016 and will continue in 2020 we are aggressively looking at china as well. Did you see other states in 2016 besides china and russia quick. I would refer back to the report released in 2017. In the 2018 general elections was found that any identified activities that have a Material Impact of the security infrastructure used in the 2018 midterm elections that there was no hard evidence that they change through the system. You previously worked on the Voter Registration list so can you tell me about the importance of those that are uptodate quick. Absolutely. The national Voter Registration act that ensures both individuals are able to get registered but if somebody is not in their jurisdiction with the proper way having those allows jurisdictions to save money and ensures the right people are where they need to b be. My time is expired. The gentle lady from texas. Thank you chairman and Ranking Member for the hearing and all witnesses for your service to the nation. Let me ask a question for each of you. How confident are you we will have the impeccable safe and secure election in 2020 with the work that you have now done at the federal level . Or without intrusion from foreign entity. Thank you for your question. Anybody that has run election can tell you there is no such thing as impeccable but absolutely we are confident the 2018 election was more secure than 2016 and 2020 will certainly be more secure thanks to the hard work of officials of the private sector thats working with them. Yes or no. Im confident against the threat to Election Security. Agreed. Agreed the sentiments that traveling around the country it is amazing to see all of the Election Officials are doing to address the issue. But none of you have said we cannot have the impeccable election they think they are owed the impeccable election to be honest. I will follow up my line of question being of how secure are we . And proceed to raise the question that in light of the fact there seems to be a loophole of security, what is the approach of the doj to prosecute and be proactive or what intrusions may occur in the 2020 election quick. We will be very proactive. One of the most important lessons coming out of 2016 is how we handle information that may be targeted getting victim notifications to the right people and following up and we are in a better position now than we were in 2016 with policy and the sensitivity. Doj prosecutors and researchers one resources need to be ready for that and other federal elections. I think we are wellpositioned also the budget for 2020 includes Additional Resources that will improve our standing in that regard. Congratulations to the congresswoman for the work of her committee on the question of shielding us from this kind of intrusion and including her congratulations to include my legislation this year the language that says of a candidate for any individual knowingly receives an offer for assistance then they know is a foreign power that kennedy shall refuse the offer and notify the fbi within 72 hours. The intent should be acted upon so what infrastructure do you have to ensure a Quick Response to any reporting of this activity quick. Thank you for the question the fbi becomes interested in foreign influence once it hits the category we spoke about in the beginning with the undeclared nature. The fbi will respond in any investigation not only the Foreign Influence Task force but those hundreds of agents or analyst for that day in and day out we will use all the tools in our toolbox. And your staff for the 2020 election the potential of this reporting quick. We could always use more resources but for sure we put everything we can against this threat facing with absolute determination. The Homeland Security committee i appreciate the deep dive you have taken. Give me an understanding of how you have shared actionable intelligence to identify threats and ramped up that part of your work quick. Absolutely. First is the buildout of the election information this is what we use to reach state and local officials we have all 50 states and territories as well as 2100 local Election Officials so this ensures actionable and timely information is reached in the field so they can take the steps they need. Second, a continued push with the Intelligence Community to provide classified briefings whether conferences or in person as well as working with private sector Threat Intelligence authorities with private Sector Companies about what they see internationally so we explore all avenues trying to find efficient ways to get this to Election Officials. The gentle lady from arizona. My first question, does anyone with foreign influence have pfizer applications or warrants quick. No maam. Looking back at the fbis activities investigating 2016 election it has been reported that the fbi never obtained the original servers from the dnc that allegedly were hacked by russia instead relying on image copies. First of all is that correct . I cannot speak to that. And someone else on the panel . Yes maam we got the information that we required for our investigation and its pretty common for us to work with a security vendor in connection with computer intrusion. Can either one of you answer did the dnc cybersecurity consultant strike still have possession of the clinton servers quick. I dont know what they have possession of now. Does anyone on the panel though . Next question. I know you were asked what other countries have shown an interest in disrupting the 2020 election but what other countries have shown interest or try to interfere in the 2016 elections quick. Based on what i have read in what has been put out and investigations by congress it only refers to russia that i am aware. Earlier there was a question by chairman nadler and i want to clarify what you think or if you think its appropriate for the president of the United States to ask a Foreign Government to investigate previous election interference for i would like all of you to answer that question. Can you please repeat the question. To think its appropriate for the president to ask a Foreign Government to investigate previous election interference . If there was election interference going on . You know if there is anything he thinks was unlawful and other countries are asked the other countries to determine if there was something unlawful happenin happening. I think its appropriate to understand any attempts of interference in our election so we can continue to work to build resilience in the process. The fbi is interested in any criminal violation as long as there is the foreign angle to the operation. I will give the same answer as before i dont know about appropriate but i am focused on the criminal law. It is important to understand what occurred with our election so officials have the information they need to prepare for future elections. I yelled back my time. Thank you mister chair in 2016 i understand there were reports that russia tried to interfere with a lot estate election goals, maybe all of them is anybody here aware of those reports . Yes dhs in coordination with the fbi released an information product out to officials that stated based on the information we had as far as activity in 2016 the pattern of behavior is likely that the russian actors conducted at least research on entities across all 50 states. That doesnt mean they attempted to access the systems it could be as simple as a Google Search but based on the information that the Intelligence Community has that it is assumed they were at least researching all 50 state elections. Why would they do that quick. Presumably to understand how elections are run across the United States. Spring training . Anybody else have knowledge of that or your thoughts . What about florida was there reports that two different jurisdictions Voting Systems were contacted by the russians . I think we have briefed officials on activity targeted systems with successful intrusions but i think its important to be clear that there was no Material Impact on registration based on the evidence we have seen to be clear about that. And as i mentioned in my Opening Statement, it appears that the vast majority of that will be spent we are seeing over 90 of that going towards improving security and again whether that is replacing out the equipment from implementing audit based on a number of things because the variations in how elections are administered state to state to identify priority states have taken the information that is dated based on the work in the states where the risks lie and used to apply and i will give you a specific example of a the state of wisconsin deployed two factor authentication and after all of its local officials for the statewide Voter Registration database that we seem remarkable and you realize the 1800 jurisdictions in wisconsin if they focused targeted steps theyve taken. In the Clinton Campaign they stole emails and said shame on us we are not ready this time around. Have you consulted with the president or anyone involved in the campaign . We have made contact and off with just the Trump Campaign that goes around the president ial election campaigns to make sure they are aware of the services and information sharing responsibility. The stalwarts in the american system of government and the rule of law and i would have to disagree with previous statements made and individuals in the organizations responsible its the one i caused by those actions i wish this were a sincere hearing ended up where we might be marking up some of the Bipartisan Legislation members of the committee have worked on. By the congresswoman murphy, mr. Deutsch, myself to have greater connectivity prior to any intrusion or we might be marking up the legislation joined by mr. Colins and 3238 would create greater consequence for those that engage in election interference but that isnt what this is about. Its about smearing the president of the United States, aninvalidating the people who he been involved in delegitimizing a historical election and we know that because moments ago the chairman said that he was acting in the highest traditions of Government Service and i believe you hold the job engaging in an extramarital affair and the fbi with a coworker acting in the highest tradition of Government Service. Im not going to comment on the. Are there regulations against it but you are aware of . Im not going to comment on that. Are you saying you dont know if it is extramarital affair with a coworker asked i hold a slightly different job and he held over the Intelligence Branch. He was over the operational branch. I am just not going to comment on whether or not his behavior was out of context. Is in the highest tradition of the service for the fbi to engage in affairs o a series ofs you should know that if you work there. I am not going to comment on the. Maybe i will ask another one. The Inspector General said we do not have confidence to prioritized the investigation over following up on the midyear investigation and the Inspector General didnt have confidence in the way someone prioritized something is acting in the highest tradition of Government Service flex i am not going to comment on the. Further, they foun found thae only indicative of the biased, but even more suspiciously, implied the willingness to take action to contact the candidates electoral process and this is anticritical to the core values of the fbi and department of justice if someone, anyone is engaging in behavior that is antithetical to the values of the fbi and department of justice are they acting in the highest traditions of the government . We have an entire Section Division is goin and not going r these questions from the position that im in. Its just interesting the unwillingness to be critical of the conduct so detrimental to the country and as people all over america are looking at the corruption that negatively impacted they say you know what its about idea to have affairs with your colleagues and underlining the trust people having to be prioritized in investigations of her politics but nonetheless, here we sit. You announced an impeachment inquiry in the committee and i believe you our committee would be engaged i in that process but as the secure today, three other committees are in the basement of the capitol conducting secret interviews engaging in selective and coming out having a theatrical performances of transcripts that didnt really occur and there are lies of the contacts with whistleblowers. Regardless how people feel, one would at least think the chairman of the Judiciary Committee announces the launch of an impeachment investigation members of the committee might be willing to pour enabled to participate in that when weve gone to participate would have been locked out so it is my sincere hope the last time we gathered that he would take up the cause not just of someones purpose and ambition but that he would take up the cause of the committee and ask fo asked for y to participate because one can only suspect the reason the house Judiciary Committee has been dealt out of the hand of the impeachment is because Speaker Pelosi didnt like the outcomes in the committee they didnt know what to do with it. When House Democrats brought in Robert Mueller there were promises that this was going to sway the public and create a flood of support for impeachme impeachment, and that was obviously something that didnt hold to their. So, please stand up for the committee and lets start with this. I will yield back. Thank you mr. Chairman. I think the witnesses for being here today. I would hardly call this busy work to protect our elections, so i wish our colleagues on the otheother side would be as concd with Election Security. Back in july the Senate Select committee released its bipartisan report on russian interference in our 2016 elections. The senate intel found that come up wit,quote, russian government affiliated conducted a level of activity against the infrastructure in the runup to the 2016 u. S. Election and called for sweeping action to protect the 2020 elections that canada after counting the vote and the officials report the results were tempered with him if in fact the candidate one what is being done at the federal level to first prevent attacks on the results in the second, if such an attack occurs to ensure Public Confidence in the reporting of our elections mr. Masterson lets start with you and then move on. The reporting systems that you are referencing for an area weve worked with our officials to secure and understand first the most important thing to understand that all of the folks on the committee here understand the results are in fact unofficial results but there is a campus process that goes on after election day so ensuring they have that information and understanding the nature of the results and that there is an entire reconciliation process following the correctness and the second is the top priority for us working with officials to have the results and ensure efficient and effective auditing of the results but is absolutely critical to ensure that their vote was counted so that is to areas of higtwoareas of high prs working with state and local of the steps theyre taking to protect the systems and really offer the reassurance and transparency on the backend. In this circumstance where we know the state is being targeted, its important that we get to the state officials at the right level and with a sense of urgency so they can do whatever they can to mitigate the systems. I would echo what mr. Masterson said and added that the commission, the part of the work that we have done is host it trainings for the officials that is relevant to the topic and work with them on an improving audit processes and certainly think that the issue you raised is one of real concern. There are a number of responsibilities that the officials have and i believe that the election Assistance Commission should be more empowered to work on those but the reality has been mentioned in my Opening Statement is that we are 7. 95 million agent fee and we have one lawyer, one financial person for since its inception the commission has been kicked around like a political football and we have never been in power ar empowered in a way to actually help Election Officials in the way that we can and i think that right now in this time we see the need for the federal clearinghouse that it was created to be and i would ask you all to help make that possible. Thank you. As a senior Cyber Security advisor, how have you engaged with local, state and National Media outlets to ensure the unofficial vote reporting is protected from malicious interference and with Media Networks specifically have you met with, and have any refused to meet with you and with new measures are you taking a in 2020 that were not applied in 2016 and 2018 . Thank you for the question. The first is that the associated press, the team that handles the result is on Election Night is t is a member river were coordinating council which is the council that we work with on providing support and services and information sharing, so they have been an active participant in that coordinating council to the extent of the threat and risk they can take to secure the results for the reporting and i know hes taking that very seriously. Second, as we held a tabletop exercise with members of the National Media prior to the election to talk about some scenarios that can play out in house at being exchanged not just from state and local officials but Media Companies, Political Parties and others to ensure that the media have access to the information they need before they report on the results or other items. Heading into 2020, we anticipate engaging Media Outlets individually that have a tabletop exercise again heading into the 2020 election to work with ththrough the scenarios ane they have the information they need. Digital yields back. The gentleman from virginia. I want to thank the witnesses for being here. I am concerned and cosponsored the bill which would amend the immigration act to those that have engaged in improper interference in elections inadmissible to the u. S. And also cosponsored 3238 which would prohibit interference. I want to go ahead and ask in your testimony you say we do know our adversaries are trying to influence Public Opinion and electoral in advance of the election. Youve mentioned in your testimony influencing the opinion in various social media. What electoral policies, what efforts to interfere are you aware of . Thank you for the question. One thing i want to highlight is the countries that russia and china prove they are a threat its not just based on the electoral sites and operations, is essentially always present. And it comes to the electoral process, you can look at some of the Voter Suppression. The whole concept of pushing out false and information. Of highlighting, places to go but are actually not true, the concept of disinformation that we have seen the russian focus on. That in and of itself can interfere in the process. But nothing to the extent of actively trying to hack into or interfere. We havent seen anything specific regarding hacking into the systems of the 2020 election. Thank you. I would yield the remainder of my time. Thank you for yielding. Im curious if theres a unanimous consent request. First is the request to be entered into the record and email on the 30th of may titled documents on the Ukrainian Party of the regions. Without objection. I also see to enter into the record of the article to summer 12, 2018 the ukrainian corporals disclosed disclosure meddling in the u. S. Elections. Without objection. Also, from 2018 from the post, the publication of the payments violated law from interfere with elections and court rules. Without objection. What is happening is this a law firm that hires and it seems to email to her husband about issues with manafort and ukraine and then works its way into the u. S. Election dynamic and the court ruled that the activities to disclose the activities in the United States constituted election interference and was illegal under the ukrainian law. Does anyone on the panel that has a reason to disagree with the conclusion of the Ukrainian Court that the constituted . So, no one has reacted on any basis to disagree with this and the record reflect that. So, my question is what are we doing as a government to prevent future election meddling like that which ukraine engaged in where information was disclosed in the United States unlawfully in the foreign jurisdiction and then entered into the enter intm of the politics of . Thank you for the question. I will go back to what i said previously. The fbi is not in the position to police content on the internet. That being said that they can identify it for an actor regardless of the country who is trying to push out this information with the end goal of showing discord, discounting the process and it is done in some sort of a undeclared criminal matter that is where it becomes an interest to the fbi. The trick is identifying that known for an afternoon we cannot work back from content. If we find that for an actor behaving in these obligations and part of the validation tells disinformation yes that would work with the providers to provide as much actual intelligence as we possibly can. In this case it looks like we must know the actor because the court ruled the disclosure of the information was illegal so is there anything the fbi is doing now to follow up on the decision that there was illegal meddling in the United States that emanated from ukraine . I cant address anything related to the possibility on the existence or nonexistence of an fbi investigation. It would seem my colleague said this a few days between now and the upcoming election i hope sincerely that this meddling is being identified and pursued by the government and i would yield back. The gentleman from florida. Thank you mr. Chairman for holding todays hearing. And thanks to the witnesses for being here. We know that they interfered and that the National Security experts have warned that they will do it again in 2020, 2020 primaries are fast approaching so we are running short on time to ensure every state is taking the necessary steps to harden the differences and to guard against this generally. One of the fewer than 20 states that still had electronic machines to verify the ballots in 2016 and they are moving in a different direction between 2016 and 2018 they drop from 24 to four to move completely to the paper verified systems under way. After learning some of the systems were in 2016 they expected a strong response to bolster the security and we expect that whenever it is done anof olympic coordination with state and counties targeted by the Foreign Governments and other benefactors. According to the report the russian theory agency was able to gain access to the network of at least one florida county government. Subsequently, members of our congressional delegation requested a briefing from the lawenforcement agencies and work informed that the networks of at least two counties that have been compromised. Most recently, the report by the republicanled Senate Intelligence committee suggest as many as four counties may have been successfully attacked. Apparently no systems for access, only the registration rules, but whatever the number infected, weve got to learn the lessons and guard against the vulnerabilities before next years elections in florida clearly worked on its need to improve the auditing procedures, but we cannot do that alone. Certain breaches were not immediately detected. What signs should Election Officials look for, what should they be trained to look for on election day to ensure there are no attacks and how are you working with state officials to train them to detect such signs . Thank you for the question, sir. It starts long before election day. You may be looking for those signs and i will talk about our activity there, but there are indicators that Election Officials are aware of and can be attuned to. But to our information sharing and Analysis Center targeting election infrastructure and the state of florida was the first state to deploy this across all county governments. To reach protect and recover from this. In our hearing witnesses stressed the importance of the interconnected systems and we heard any device that touches these must be safeguarded to the Device Security management centralized and i would like to hear from each of the witnesses what your organization is doing to help centralize and streamline the security process. We will start with you. Yes. So, essentially if the Systems Commission we are participating in the Government Coordinating Council. We consistently worked to put out best practices, but again sorted through our capacity moving beyond our statutory requirements is very limited as we have the world series coming to washington i would note that if we were a Major League Baseball player we would be the 173rd highest. We would be a middle reliever. We have no lack of ambition to take on these challenges and help, but we need the resources to do it. Appreciate the world series reference. Im going to answer a bit of analogy. We have a number of Department Components on the security. Weve got fbi agents in the field and headquarters, prosecutors in the field, public corruption prosecutors, National Security prosecutors, computer crime prosecutors. All of them potentially touch on this issue and so it is on us to train them so they are aware of each other in a coordinated and that is what we are doing this weekend at the end of the week rather the end of the month the fbi is putting together an all hands on meeting with agents around the country to train them including on how to react and relate to state officials when it comes to the notifications. Thank you for your question. I distrust the task force whose purpose was to be with you just asked to coordinate the efforts across the enterprise as it relates to Election Security. We have election crimes coordinators across all of the field offices whose primary goal is to interact with officials. Leading up to today of the election we have got our Cyber Task Forces across all 56 of our field offices and we are working to increase our task forces as well. And the Foreign Influence Task force really is the hub brings all of the efforts together again leading up to, during and after. Thank you for the question, sir. Across the cybersecurity and researchers at the agency, over a third of our ambiguities in 2018 engaged in Security Work across the United States. We have field representatives protecting the security advise advisers. I appreciate the witnesses being here today. As the Intelligence Branch restrictive matter over the Intelligence Branch was one of our two operational branches in the ig about Hillary Clintons private server being hacked. Do you know why you were not included in that briefing . Until the fall of 2018 in the time frame i was in the counterterrorism division. Left. Yes, sir. Since the foreign influence headquarters component im concerned they ran to the biggesrented thebiggest cases is headquarters for special cases rather than the traditional way of running the cases in the field officers. As the Foreign Influence Task force running the cases from headquarters now . Knows her. Can you tell us why peter was their . Since there is such a deal about the influence peddling and 2016 and even the uk name after that that you woul he would be e bit concerned about the influence peddling when he was there, have you not looked into that at all in your current position . My focus is on the 2,020th elections and moving forward. The creation of the task force happened in the fall of 2017 way we are laser focused on those moving forward. The comment you dont think that there is anything to be learned from looking at what occurred in the 2016 election to help you prepare for whats going on and could go on in the 2020 election, really, you dont think theres anything to learn from history . There are always lessons to be learned and wha what we have learned in 2016 and i can speak strategically on the threat across the entire u. S. And the community. We are now better engage and collaborate far more on a daily basis and we are working with our social adf companies. All of it from 2018 to put the best practices forward as we move into 2020. Were you aware of dispatching to influence in 2016 . That wasnt my question. I didnt ask you that. I asked you did you know that is . Im not going to answer that question. I will be happy to go back and go into detail about the current investigations. You didnt say if you know a person. You are supposed to be telling us about 2020 and you cant even tell us about whether you know anything about people involved in 2016 if hurts the credibility when you cant do that. If you cannot even tell us about ukraine. I am very disturbed and concerned. First of all thank you to the panel for being here today and service to our country. Trusted the election election system is trust of democracy with cyberattacks time is of the essence. When Financial Institutions are attacked the militarys response within seconds is usually coordinated throughout the industry not institutions or individually but if not worldwide. Given the importance of american democracy i presume that now a lack of coordination among Government Agencies to be one of the Lessons Learned that we have a system in place now to coordinate that kind of information of a cyberattack. So a question to all of you. You are absolutely correct as it relates to cyberwe have an extremely Strategic Plan so simply put i will allow my colleagues to add on but that responses jointly look at the fbi is a threat response of the crime has been committed we will open an investigation dhs protects the vulnerability from cyberintrusion in and of itself. You open the investigation but the cyberattack happens within seconds. So how quickly or who is the leader how do you get that information out to your investigative agencies or the Defense Task Force instantaneously . You have that system in place quick. Yes. Following 2016 the top priority was to work with state and local officials to have protocols for exactly this reason. In 2016 dhs being new to not even know who to call. Now we have a point of contact and information sharing. You do have points of contact for each and every state quick. Yes. Now they know how to share information with us. The most likely people to repor report. Now individuals for each state who to talk to quick. Are we talking silos or is it a twoway street cracks you have folks at the state level that you trust to work with that you all share the information on a realtime basis quick. Absolutely. We have point of contact across all 50 states so they feel comfortable sharing that information and we can take not just respond to the individual incident but take that response distribute it broadly across the entire community so they can take defensive actions or look for possible compromises across the entire infrastructure thats the biggest area of improvement since 2016 the amount of information we are receiving from officials on a regular basis whether it is reporting for those detections. At the secretary of state of california calls you do you return the call immediately . How does that get channeled into the system or is it even a phone call quick sword you have a digital system where somebody types in the alert something is going on . A certain viruses detected so the rest of the country quick. Yes. He does have my number and calls me regularly. It is an incredibly engaged partner. That is correct a report to one is the report to all within the operations center. We have members of the fbi and Intelligence Community and election in for mary information sharing sitting on the floor as reporting comes in we can take that information and analyze it and support the victim but then begin the process to share broadly across the sector. Elections are not just about election day but that. In california it is three weeks. So how do you assure that whatever you detect three weeks out that you follow up one follow up on and is coordinated quick. Working for information sharing and Analysis Center if there are additional facts or jurisdictions, we can coordinate that and look for those trends and the information to connect. I have been through a number of elections i detected irregularities. So 2020 i walk doortodoor i see Something Weird who do i call or google your telephone number quick. Depending on the activity of private Public Sector individual. So from our perspective you can report any local election official who can remediate that. In addition we work with Voter Protection groups in 2018 and will in 2022 have points of contact on election day that there is reporting that indicates a trend we can reach out in coordination. I yield back. I recognized the vice chair of the committee once again thank you for beginning this hearing. Thank you chairman. On october 3rd the fbi issued an advisory to stay Election Officials the russian government would be using Voter Suppression tactics to interfere in the 2020 election. Can you give us any idea when the fbi learned about these or any gap in time when the threat was identified and the states were notified quick. Thank you for the question. I cannot speak in specifics about the reporting but as a rule with 2020 as with 2018 that is our goal across the entire Intelligence Community to report information as quickly as possible to the audience who needs to hear it taking into account the sensitivity of how that was collected. You talked about the Foreign Influence Task force formed in 2017 you described it was expanded after 2018 and a glowing list of foreign adversaries youre looking at. So can you tell us the number of people that make up that task force of that has grown from the present or if you need additional people or resources to do that job quick. Thank you for the question i will not get specifics with the individuals on the task force but our intentions that are the same for 2020 but what i will note those and are not the only individuals working on foreign influence given that nebulous nature on the investigative side on the house to counterterrorism as well their agents and analysts across all field offices who work foreign influence in investigations. Regarding resources we are happy to have more resources and can use more resources but they use everything they can right now to mitigate this serious threat. Is the reason you cant give us the numbers between 2017 because you dont have them or is there a security reason quick. No security reason but its hard to compare when we are only focused on russia with the expansion to include all global actors that participate its not necessarily a good one one comparison of where we have com come. You mention one aspect of the dojs efforts to disrupt operatives has stepped up enforcement of Foreign Agent registration act that are required to register with our government. So we know some of those would have a guilty plea by Michael Flynn and the convictions of the Trump Campaign manager Paul Manafort. Possible involvement of Mister Giuliani or possible violations are those the kind of things you are talking about quick. With respect to the last case those are Campaign Finance violations but i think the charges if they lead to a foreign location that kind of activity we would be alert to. At the moment the charges are Campaign Finance allegations. But stepping back if there are indications of a foreign principal covertly trying to influence politics whether a Campaign Finance or political activity we would be involved in. The one i really concerned about which is listed on doj is the Enforcement Actions with the 13 russian nationals who worked on behalf of the russian government to interfere in the 2016 election by manipulating social media to advocate for the Trump Campaign against the Clinton Campaign. Organizing political rallies like in pennsylvania where they literally took pictures of coal miners and slapped them on the rally pages and try to disrupt them in a particular direction. Does doj have the resources it needs to prosecute those malign actors as we approach malign actors as we approach the 2020 election captioning performed by vitac i think the 2020 budget includes additional funding for the sections i supervised which is devoted to foreign influence in addition to Cyber Threats. How about moving before the 2020 election, because unfortunately those convictions came two years after the influence in 2016. Yes, as i said in my Opening Statement, preventing a crime is more rewarding and important than convicting someone after the fact. And we put a lot of thought into how he will disrupt that and how we will provide communications to various people to make sure the public is as educated as we make them. Thank you. I see my time is expired. The gentle lady from texas. Thank you, mr. Chairman. And as my colleague noted earlier, the report on russian interference in 2016 election states that many disinformation campaigns and Cyber Threats do not manipulate just one platform. It moves across various platforms and threatened multiple companies. There must be greater cooperation with the tech sector and the government to address these issues. In fact, we saw today that facebook removed a network of russia backed accounts that posted as legals commenting on issues in swing states and attacking former Vice President jobe. This is a familiar threat that we saw in 2016 and appears to be repeating as we approach 2020. The report we referenced recognized collaboration and content sharing to defend against foreign disinformation as occurred with violent extremist content. This is simply a yes or no, have your organizations created a task force to coordinate cooperation between government and the tech sector as they did with violent extreme content . Ill defer to my colleague at the fbi as well, but, yes, were working with my team, we have a team working on countering foreign influence that works with the social media and tech sector on these issues. And will be ready for 2020 . Absolutely, yes. Thank you, maam, for the question. Within the Foreign Influence Task force is a significant effort to increase engagement with both the tech sector and social Media Companies. Weve created a relationship wherein we share with them intelligence and threat indicators, they share with us information related to individuals who have violated their terms of service. Its one of our primary strategies as we roll into 2020. I do you have a specific task force that helps coordinate all of that or leaving it up to each group to cooperate with each other . Its within the Foreign Influence Task force, thats one of our goals is to coordinate that engagement with social Media Companies as it relates to foreign influence. All right. So, dhss report detailed the disinformation model including Deepfake Technology and digital message creation attacks. Can you please describe the impact of these type of threats to our election and is what dhs is doing to combat them regarding misinformation about Voter Registration . My team within the Election Security Initiative Starting in 2018 began working with state and local Election Officials to talk to them about ways to engage voters about disinformation around the elections process. Election officials see this regularly, whether through social media or other activity. Its not new to Election Administration and so we wanted to work with them on a variety of products to help them engage the electorate on what to look for but also how to empower them as voters, make sure they understand when and where to vote, whats on their ballot, how the election process works and to understand who the trusted voices in their communities are, those local election official and is state Election Officials who have the information they need to they can head to the polls with confidence. Building on that effort, our team is focused on expanding that engagement, working with trusted voices across communities, mayors, governors, to engage the American People about how to identify disinformation and how to build resilience i heard your testimony on that. But your written testimony you also said that you wanted to raise Public Awareness and with 8,800 jurisdictions, one of you all testified to that, how are you really getting the word out with 8,800 jurisdictions that have to be on the lookout for this. Youre talking across the country. When i saw, again, in one of you yalls testimony, i think you were focused on a handful of states that youve done some of these table top exercises. What are you really doing to make sure that all 8,800 election jurisdictions now how to detect, report and work with you on these issues. Absolutely. Thank you for the question. So its twofold. One is, by building those relationships with the state Election Officials, they reach the counties too. I mentioned in my testimony the last Mile Initiative. Its geared toward county officials about how to manage risk and threat including how to talk to voters about the process and manage voters expectations. The second is the tabletops. Its not the individual tabletops with states. We conduct exercises are thousands of local Election Officials in coordination with their chief state election official, participated over three days this year, and next year, to talk through what you said, how does information get shared, how do we push it down to the locals and how do they get it back up to us so we have full awareness and understand what is the threat at risk and how do they protect the systems. Thank you, mr. Chairman, i yield back. The gentleman from colorado. Thank you, mr. Chair for holding this incredibly important and timely hearing. I also want to thank each of the witnesses for their testimony and also for your service to our country. I must confess, im disappointed by some, not all, but some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who chose to use their time impugning the integrity of officials. And i realize that each i dont have u in your respective departments work with a wide range of colleagues on precisely that, and i thank you for it. I reviewed the written testimony of each of the witnesses. In your testimony, you noted on page 3, and i believe you alluded to this in your verbal testimony, in the run up to the midterm elections, social Media Companies deacted social media accounts linked to malign foreign influence actors. They immediate these decisions with the fbi and only Government Agencies. I take from that that you have a robust relationship with the social Media Companies, both the fbi, the task force and obviously other apparatuses of doj, i take that to be true. Is that a fair estimate . Yes, sir. And i very much appreciate the work that the traffask forcd the fbi and other entities are taking, the steps that theyre taking to protect the integrity of your elections. Part of what is the most disturbing for me and gives me the post pause is what you mentioned earlier which is that its happening in realtime. Foreign actors, by the disinformation campaigns that they are engaged in, utilizing the social media engines that we all use in our daily lives, theyre changing the way americans think and americans interact with each other, the way in which we view Public Policy issues. And im sure youre familiar, there was a report recently, it was covered by cnn from the ira copy campaign issued on october 21st, 2019, russian accounts posing as americans on instagram, targeting both sides ahead of the 2020 election. Are you familiar with this report . In title only, sir. Okay. Mr. Hickey, are you familiar with the report . Same answer. With consent, i would ask that this report be submitted to the record. Without objection. I will quote from this. Facebook announced the take down of 50 instagram accounts posting about u. S. Social and political issues in the 2020 election. Facebook concluded that the operation originated from russia and showed some links to the russian troll farm that previously targeted audiences in 2016. These accounts are attacking kamala harris, elizabeth warren, almost half of the accounts claim to be based in swing states, especially florida. And what theyre doing is not all dissimilar from what they did before, focusing on divisive content. Much of the content posted by these accounts was divisive. Often the sets of accounts posted on both sides of divisive issues, for instance, Police Violence was a topic addressed by accounts, such of them posting with black lives matter and others with blaue lives matter. Youre familiar with these accounts . Yes, sir. Yes, sir. The question i have, clearly our Law Enforcement agencies are working very hard to try to combat this disinformation, but it strikes me that the root cause or one of the root causes of the disinformation is the reality of anonymous accounts in these social media engines. And theres been a lot of discussion as to whether or not universal verification as opposed to having to constantly be reactive working with these social Media Companies, like facebook, as a prime example, that instead we could get at the root cause and it would eliminate so much of this disinformation and misinformation thats been perpetrated at the American Public. I would like to get your sense as to whether or not thats something that your agencies have discussed internally and whether or not its something you might recommend we take up as a matter of discussion on a policy basis. So, sir, i will agree with you that tit poses a Cyber Security challenge. Its a leading one. And how you address that is very tricky, how you have verification, authenticity, in a way that you know whos emailing sending you a message is the person they claim to be. At the moment, we are im not in a position to comment on legislation or propose it. What were trying to do is where we see indications that someone isnt who they claim to be along the lines of what ms. Floris said, they tie to individuals that we are investigating, well tip the providers to it so they can get behind that. Were currently prosecuting entities that we allege are tied to the Internet Research agency in District Court right now. But certainly were hoping to impose consequences for activity related to 2016. The gentlemans time is expired. The gentle lady from georgia. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you so much for convening this hearing today. Thank you each and every one of you for being here. Voting, i think, all of us would agree is basically the foundation of our democracy. And protecting our ability to be able to vote and protecting our voting infrastructure from foreign interference is paramount. In georgia, we learned that before the 2016 election, a russian agent visited the websites of fulton counties looking for vulnerabilities. While it appears that the agent didnt gain access in 2016, we continue to face attacks to this very day. Just last month it was reported that two computers were stolen from both stolen from fulton county, there, again, my district. They contain Sensitive Information that relates to every single voter in georgia. And so as we take on these threats, i want to make sure that were working to build collaboration and transparency across the federal government, the states and for the American People. I want to ask each of you about how we can increase this transparency while also improving Election Security. Mr. Hickey, ill start with you. Im curious about your thoughts on whether states should be treated differently than other victims that doj prosecutes in terms of sharing victims identities. It was report that had the election systems in two florida counties were breached. But the government has not identified which florida counties were breached. On one hand we want to encourage states to represent and to talk about these vulnerabilities, to report them and sharing state specific information publicly could discourage such reporting. But on the other hand, we want the public to have confidence in our election system and we want them to have confidence in the transparency of our election process. So indeed, you testified and im sorry i was not here this morning, you testified, foreign influence operations ultimately may be one of the best ways to counter them, end quote. Can you speak to how you think the federal government should navigate disclosing information into the Election Security contest. Thank you. I appreciate your nuanced treatment of that issue. We do as the vice chair of the committee said, we want to encourage and guard the trust of the states so that they are willing to call the fbi and not worry that we are going to release their identities or the problem publicly. Two, i think core principles, one, we think it is a matter for state officials to decide when they decide when they disclose to their publics what the threats to their particular infrastructure have been. So we will leave it to florida officials to communicate with the voters in that state or any other state, hey, we worked with the fbi, weve done x, y and z, were going to leave it to that state. But the second key principle i think is that it is ultimately state level officials who are are accountable for certifying the results of an election. And so were currently the fbi currently is reviewing guidance on how to handle victim nofgs in the context of elections and its not out yet, but i anticipate that well continue to notify system owners and operators, which may be local officials, but also providing a headsup to the politically accountable chief state election official or board so that they are aware of what the fbi is doing at a more local level. Thank you. And mr. Masterson and ms. Floris, i would like to hear from you on your policies and whether more transparency is actually needed. So, ill speak to that very briefly. As i mentioned prior in the hearing, weve established Communications Protocols with the state and local agencies to empower them to speak to activity targeting their systems or possible incidents and then most importantly, being transparent and sharing indicators in an unclassified environment about what threats are targeting election systems so that they can not only take defensive measures but talk to their voters about the threat being real and the steps that theyre taking to secure the process so that voters know that theyre taking it seriously and responding. And i think this is where running elections at the state and local level really is critical. Voters have the ability to encourage directly with those who run elections and have their questions answered. They can be poll workers, they can watch preelection testing of the system, they can watch post election auditing. How can we empower those officials with information to talk to the voters and respond. Thank you, maam, for your question. One thing i can add admission to my colleagues on the panel. When it comes to being transparent, one of the prongs is to share intelligence and information as quickly as possible and to whoever needs to receive that information. Certainly that is not a decision that we can make unilaterally. Rest assured, it is one of our strategies to be as forwardleaning as we can and sharing intelligence to the people who need to receive it. Time of the gentle lady has expired. The gentle lady from pennsylvania. Thank you, mr. Chairman. And i want to thank all of you for being here and representing to us the important work youre doing to protect our elections. We take this very, very seriously and i can see that you do too. For the viewing public, we have the department of Homeland Security, we have the fbi, the department of justice, we have the u. S. Election Assistance Commission. Youre so important on the front line and were here to partner with you. Ill start this question quickly to ms. Floris. On october 8th, 2019, the Senate Intelligence Committee Published its second volume on russian interference in the 2016 elections and the u. S. Governments response to that attack. The report concluded that in october of 2017, the Counter Intelligence division tasked an outside contractor to identify russian interference activity on twitter. And, quote, the fbi either lacked resources or viewed the work in this vein not warranted. The Senate Committees report is concerning. Do you believe you have enough resources at fbi to investigate and protect our elections. Thank you, maam, for that question. As ive said, we can always use more resources. Were throwing everything we have against the foreign influence threat. We continue to engage with all 56 of our field offices to ensure theyre tracking the threat. How often are you using outside contractors . Are you moving away from that particularly in the issue of Election Security . Maam, i cant speak specifically on the use of outside contractors within our workforce. We have contractors throughout many parts of the fbi. I cant speak specifically as to how many are working on the foreign influence threat. We would love that information if you could share it with us. Can you tell us whether or not we have ever used an outside contractor from russia, iran, china, north korea . Do you know . Maam, i would defer that question to our Human Resources division, our security division. Well follow up. I would like to ask each of you the same thing, do you have adequate resources at your departments and do you use outside contractors. Thank you, maam. We have the resources we need to build on the success that we had in 2018 and continue to support state and local Election Officials certainly with more resources comes greater capacity and responsiveness, the ability to increase support or build on Something Like remote Penetration Testing, but we have what we need to build on the success and i defer you to Human Resources and security. I would say that the election Assistance Commission absolutely does not have the resources that we need. I would also echo that the fy 18, 380 million that went to the states, that was a great first step, it did not provide the states with the funding levels to solve all of the challenges they face. Weve seen people prioritizing for a menu of options, but there are a number of things that state and local Election Officials can do and additional funding is crucial to help them do that. Thank you for sharing that with us. Briefly, the 2020 budget would increase funding for the Counter Intelligence section which would help in our efforts to confront malign foreign influence and hacking. I dont think we employ contractors specifically for this area of work, though, of course we do have contractors working in the Justice Department and they are vetted. But choosing contractors reflects our judgment there, folks with expertise that we can bring on and use them, Foreign Investment security reviews, we have contractors on board and we use them because we have particular experience. Do you use any foreign contractors from russia, china, iran . What i do know is that we vet contractors and they have to be screened for a security clearance. I cant speak to their nationalities, but i know they would be vetted. Whats concerning to us or me is that the president s fiscal year 2020 Budget Proposal would cut funding to cisa especially concerning because 2020 is the president ial year. Many have said the threat is persistent, per va sis, sweeping, systematic. You talked about the disinformation, could you be specific as to the give us a concrete example of what it looked like. How were voters disinformed . Are you talking leading into the 2016 election . 2016. I can certainly take that question back. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Gentle lady from texas. Many thanks to our witnesses. We appreciate your testimony today and work. I am still very concerned and i think the American Public should be concerned about our elections approaching in 2020. We know that three years ago, rush was wildly successful in attacking our democracy by attacking our elections and despite the information that we have and despite the unified voice from our Intelligence Community, we have a president who is cutting resources to our Election Security and it is stunning to me that the president of the United States would be willing to erode our Election Security instead of fighting to keep it safe. Our Voting Machines are still outdated. Many of the vulnerabilities still remain today and so we should all be very concerned and i hope that you all will continue your work to confront the obstacles ahead of you and to inform the American Public. With that said, we know that special counsel muellers indictment noted that one of the ways that they interfered with our 2016 elections was by encouraging minority voters not to participate in elections. In fact the Pew Research Center found in 2016 africanamerican turnout dropped by 20 despite the fact that we had record turnout in the country. The report detailed the strategies russia used and to discourage africanamericans from voting. What steps are you taking to combat interference efforts to discourage minority groups from voting and are those steps sufficient . Thank you for your question, maam. Our focus in coordination with the fbis Foreign Influence Task force is really on building resilience in the American People, talking to them how their being targeted with disinformation, where the source of information with regard to the election process or otherwise would be. So, weve created a variety of products and are working with various communities and groups, reaching out to groups like the naacp to provide resources to them, recognizing theyre the trusted voice in their community that can talk to their members about how they may be targeted with disinformation and how they respond. Thank you for your question. This whole concept of Media Literacy with the American Public, we cannot stress enough to understand, when, how, where to vote. Your vote matters and is up to you to have that Media Literacy to understand where youre obtaining your information. Ill hit on our encourage with social Media Companies and our willingness to engage with them as it relates to disinformation when we know that a foreign actor is trying to propagate disinformation. Continuing that dialogue with the social media as we roll into 2020. The Justice Department helps investigate those actors. Were there to obtain Legal Process of various forms, to investigate what foreign actors are doing and that information can be part of the information that is shared with the providers to confront the disinformation that youre suggesting. When the disinformation crosses over to talk about the election process or Election Administration issues, like, when you vote or how to register or how to participate, that would certainly be where it would fall into our interest area and in doing that, were really working with state and locals to encourage their voters or their citizens to participate, to be able to identify trusted sources of information, be able to check their voter regulation to make sure its updated and accurate and those are thats where our focus has been. I have two followup questions for you. Number one, you mentioned working with social Media Outlets on preventing the spread of disinformation. We sometimes have american candidates repeating disinformation provided by russia, for example. Do you alert social media about that kind of disinformation thats coming from american candidates . Thats number one, and number two, what specific steps did you take to identify whether there were foreign efforts to discourage minority voters, whether they were used again in 2018. Thank you for your question. Ill address your first question. The fbi cannot be the truth police. It is not our job to police content as to whether or not true or false information is being propagated. We start with the foreign actor. Thats the information we then provide to the social media providers and its really up to those providers to determine whether or not that content violates their own terms of service. Regarding what steps we saw in 2018, if we saw the same activity that we saw in 2016, certainly not at the same level and i taught that to the sussccs of the inner agency group. The gentleman from georgia. Thank you, mr. Chairman, and thank you all for being here today. In february of 2019, doj and dhs issued a joint statement concluding there was no evidence to date that any identified activities of a Foreign Government or agent had a Material Impact, end quote, on the 2016 election. Now, mr. Hickey and m mmr mr. Masterson, your agencies reached this conclusion because the Intelligence Community didnt detect a threat, correct . I think thats a the eo sets forth a twostep process, including the fbi gather reports and then we evaluate the materiality of any impact. I understand. But the Intelligence Community did not detect a threat and thats why you issued your proclamation that no evidence to date was any identified activity of a Foreign Government had a Material Impact on the election. State and local officials also did not detect the threat, isnt that correct . So i think the ic did gather a report of the actions that had an intent of interfering. A threat means to us intent and purpose. State election they didnt detect a successful threat, ill put that is my understanding. All right. Thank you. You concluded also that albert s sensors did not detect a threat. They regularly defect possible malicious activity against election infrastructure, but none was detected for 2018 . Im not aware of any foreign adversary interfering or gaining access in 2016. Is it true they could have changed databases without being detected in 2018, isnt it possible . Yes or no . So we have no information to suggest that it occurred. All right. Fair enough. Now, mr. Hovland, your testimony was that 8,000 local jurisdictions conduct elections. Many of those local jurisdictions used direct recording and electronic Voting Machines, known as touch screen voting election machines in the 2016 president ial elections and also in the 2018 president ial elections. In investigating election interference after the 2016 president ial election, how many of the tens of thousands of direct recording electronic v e Voting Machines were directed to a federal audit . Im not aware of Forensic Audit that is were performed. What about any other type of testing or analysis on any direct recording electronic Voting Machines used in the 2018 elections . I would say that as far as the election Assistance Commission goes, that are you aware of any federal agencies that have conducted any analysis of direct recording, electronic Voting Machines used in the 2018 or 2016 elections. Sir, we havent been asked and i dont think its our role to audit election systems. The states certify the accuracy of the votes. My question is has the federal government used its resources to look at or conduct a Forensic Audit of any Voting Machines, any direct recording Voting Machines, either in 2016 or 2018, and it appears that the answer is no, would anybody disagree with that. To the best of my knowledge, thats correct. We have not been asked to do that. And im concerned about the 2020 election considering the insecurity of our Voting Machines that has come to light in the past three years and i would like to hear from the representative agencies the Response Plan should our elections be successfully hacked in 2020. What would be the federal response to a successful hacking in 2020 . The gentlemans time is expired. The witnesses may answer the question. Dhs stands prepared to offer a number of Incident Response Services Including deployment of teams to the locality or state, depending on the impact and infrastructure in order to conduct analysis and work to mitigate the impacts of a possible cyber intrusion on election infrastructure. In addition, we have numerous analysis capabilities remotely that we can provide to help determine if there is in fact an intrusion and the best way to mitigate. Sir, the fbi would work in consent with cisa if there was an intrusion detected, weld use all of our might to determine attribution and bring about criminal charges. And we try to prevent it. We would try to help them batten down the hatches. And on a positive note, that both with the fi 18 380 million, the number of paperless machines has decreased substantially and over 90 of americans will be voting with some type of paper audit trail. Thank you. The gentlemans time is expired. The gentle lady from florida. Thank you for coming here this morning to such an important hearing. Its been confirmed and weve talked about this several times today, that all the main intelligence agencies confirmed that russia interfered in the 2016 elections in a sweeping and systemic fashion and it wasnt just a single attempt. We have heard from several witnesses in prior hearings that they are actually engaging in interference currently as we speak. So i would to ask this, and i think the chairman may have asked this previously, but i want to get an answer from each and every one of you. Do you think its important for a sitting president to ask a Foreign Government to interfere in our elections . No. I dont like the work appropriate, maam, but i will say that we would urge anyone who has indications of such interference to come to the fbi and work with us so we can investigate criminal violences. We are certainly interested in any criminal activity as it relates to foreign influence. No. Thank you. And during the 2016 hacking, florida, my home state, was hacked and singled out by the russian government, they targeted Voter Registration systems and they were able to successfully hack into at least the systems of two different counties. We actually got a security briefing from the fbi and others on that issue. So, one of the things that i ask during that briefing is if they could say with certainty that hackers didnt manipulate the data and i was told that they actually could not, that you could not say with certainty that these hackers did not manipulate the data. Can you confirm that again with me today, please. I wasnt at the closed briefing and i dont know what touches on classified or unclassified information. We have said we have no indication to believe that there was any Material Impact on the ability to vote or the counting of votes i asked about the data. Ms. Floris . I would echo what my doj colleague said. I was not at the closed hearing but i have no reason to doubt what was briefed to you during that time. Thank you. And i know theres a group now in dhs working with officials to secure our elections. Its called the election infrastructure subsector Government Coordinating Council. The council is working to improve security protocols and works with local and state officials. Mr. Masterson and mr. Halve land, is florida on that council. Yes. Can you very briefly describe the progress of that group . Absolutely. The growth and engagement of the Government Coordinating Council has been great. We have 24 state and local members that represent a vast array of the community, they represen represents secretaries of state, local officials from across the street. And the purpose is to inform cisas approach to helping them secure elections. Whats their view of risks, what information sharing would best help them manage that risk and how do we grow that relationship. Thank you. Im going to move on now to a different topic here. Mr. Masterson, on may 1st, 2019, director crepes testified that the president had not received a briefings on russian interference in the 2020 elections, yes or no, are you aware of dhs briefing the president on russian interference in the 2020 elections . Im not aware, but that doesnt mean i didnt happen. I will say we encourage regularly in coordination with the nsc across the whole of government on this work. Do you know if your agency has tried to meet with the president on Election Security . I dont know, but that doesnt mean it hasnt happened. Do you think it would be important for the president to understand the picture before he allocates resources to agencies on Election Security . I think the work weve done across the nsc has provided the information. And so i assume thats part of their coordination with us. Thank you. And the same question to you, how many times has your agency met with the president to discuss Election Security . Thank you for the question. I cant answer that specifically. Again, that doesnt mean that it hasnt happened. I just dont know personally. Same answer, maam. Do you think it would be important for your agencies to discuss Election Security with the president . I think its important for the president to understand the National Security threats to face the president , yes. I think its important for everyone to understand the National Security threats facing the country, especially as it relates to Election Security. Thank you so much. The gentle lady yields back. This conclusions todays hearing. We thank all of our witnesses for participating. Without objection, all members will have five days to submit additional questions for the witnesses or additional materials for the record. We thank everyone. The hearing is adjourned. Zblmplts the house has