A BATTLE OVER BALLOT SECURITY
House race challenger Casten says Roskam not doing enough to protect election integrity; incumbent calls accusation a ‘stunt’
Rival candidates in the Chicago area’s hottest congressional race sparred over the issue of election hacking on Friday as Democratic challenger Sean Casten accused Republican incumbent Peter Roskam of being asleep at the switch in protecting ballot integrity.
Roskam fired back that Casten was engaging in silly political stunts.
The volley came a day after Democrats in Washington filled the U.S. House floor with chants of “USA! USA!” as they voted to pass additional funds to states for election security. But Roskam joined the GOP majority in thwarting the measure as wasteful spending.
On Friday, Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin appeared with Casten to take Roskam to task. They visited a Downer’s Grove Public Library. The Chicago suburb is in Roskam’s 6th Congressional District, a key target of Democrats seeking to win control of the House.
Durbin and Casten focused on Thursday’s party-line vote against a proposal by Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Illinois, to boost funding to state election authorities.
“My representative is doing nothing to make sure that we protect that system,” Casten said. “I am ashamed that my representative consistently sits down.”
Quigley’s amendment to the House spending bill would appropriate an additional $380 million in fiscal year 2019 to states for tightening defenses against cyber attacks on elections. Roskam was among the Republicans who voted down the amendment.
Roskam said the $380 million that was appropriated for the current year has not entirely been spent, and called the Democrats’ move “a political stunt and gimmick.”
“Sean Casten has to get serious about running for Congress. This is a political stunt, and I’m disappointed that he dragged Senator Durbin into it,” Roskam said.
Durbin called Roskam “foolish” for his vote.
“He might have thought he saved a few bucks, but if, at the end of the day, there is any question about the outcome of this election and its integrity, then we have played right into the hands of Vladimir Putin,” Durbin said.
Roskam noted that after President Donald Trump’s widely criticized appearance with the Russian president earlier this week, Roskam privately confronted Trump to raise his concerns.
“I drew contrast with what he should have done,” Roskam said. “I could tell he was very defensive. He said, ‘This is a different time, circumstances are different.’”
Roskam also pointed to legislative proposals he supports to implement sanctions on Russia’s banking and energy sectors should they attack the 2018 elections.
It was revealed last summer that there was a major “hole” in Illinois that left the voter registration database vulnerable to hackers, a flaw that was immediately addressed and communicated with local voting authorities.
A Microsoft executive has said there were three known U.S. midterm election candidates subjected to hacking attempts, but he refused to say whether Russians were the culprits or name the victims of the attacks.
“I have no idea if that was me,” Casten said.
Illinois State Board of Elections spokesman Matt Dietrich said he did not know the identities of the three described by Microsoft, but he said candidate’s records are safe.
“All candidates file their financial records with us electronically, everything we do here is subject to cyber security, we keep everything secure,” Dietrich said.
Dietrich noted that despite the concerns, voters are still registering.
Since automatic voter registration began in Illinois on July 2, there have been 20,291 new or updated registrations.