We must put partisanship aside to protect our elections
In an age where almost all issues somehow seem to turn partisan, we cannot allow an attack on democracy itself to become one of them.
On May 29, 2019, Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III gave a brief statement regarding the investigation he and his team had conducted “to ensure a full and thorough investigation of the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.” Mueller covered several topics. Media coverage focused primarily on his refusal to clear the President of wrongdoing.
While the President’s actions and apparent obstruction of justice are serious, we cannot focus on them to the exclusion of the first volume of the report, which covered a fundamental and serious threat to our democracy. Consider Muller’s opening and closing statements: “Russian intelligence officers who are part of the Russian military, launched a concerted attack on our political system,” and “I will close by reiterating the central allegation of our indictments, that there were multiple, systemic efforts to interfere in our election. And that allegation deserves the attention of every American.”
According to Mueller’s report, the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Army (GRU) used sophisticated techniques to hack into Clinton campaign computers. It used the information it stole to influence public opinion against the Clinton campaign and to strategically draw negative attention away from its preferred candidate, Donald Trump. In one prominent example, the emails of John Podesta, Clinton’s campaign manager, were released immediately after the Access Hollywood tape news broke with then-candidate Trump’s “grab ‘em” comment.
A broad network of social media accounts controlled by GRU personnel posing as American citizens amplified news of the emails and exaggerated the scandalousness of their contents. Meanwhile, other accounts worked to divide Americans along racial lines, between political parties, within the Democratic party, by religion, and along other lines. The report states that GRU operatives “also targeted individuals and entities involved in the administration of the elections. Victims included U.S. state and local entities, such as state boards of elections (SBOEs), secretaries of state, and county governments, as well as individuals who worked for those entities.” The report does not detail efforts to hack voter rolls or voting data because it was not within the scope of the Special Counsel's investigation. The few details in that section were redacted, but separate investigations have revealed that all 50 states' voting systems were targeted or hacked in 2016.
Russia’s attempts to influence our elections and hack our voting systems have continued during the 2018 midterms and into today in preparation for the 2020 elections. It would be surprising if other hostile governments were not studying their tactics.
Thanks to investigations and investigative reporting, many of these facts have been known for two years or more, but our response to them has been underwhelming. Some members of Iowa’s Congressional delegation have expressed appropriate concern, but Senator Grassley’s dismissiveness is especially alarming given that election security efforts ranging from the House Democrat “H.R.1” package to more recent, bipartisan efforts are being blocked by Senate Republicans.
Nothing is more fundamental to a democracy than its elections. That the interference helped one party in 2016 does not mean that it will help the same party in 2020, 2022, or beyond. And who was helped is beside the point: it is the right of the American people to decide who will represent us and the direction of our country. It is not the right of Russia, China, North Korea, or any other outside government. In an age where almost all issues somehow seem to turn partisan, we cannot allow an attack on democracy itself to become one of them. It is time we fight our common enemy.
A hostile foreign power attacked and undermined our highest election. If we just let that go, we are in dereliction of our duty as citizens of a democracy. We must call our senators and representatives and demand that they take concrete steps to make election security a top priority.
Kelcey Patrick-Ferree and Shannon Patrick live in Iowa.
Originally published in the Iowa City Press-Citizen on June 7, 2019.