■ The House is working on bills to improve election security.

Dems note Trump’s remarks on foreign dirt

WASHINGTON — Alarmed by President Donald Trump’s comments about being willing to accept foreign dirt on a political opponent, House Democrats are accelerating their efforts to strengthen election security ahead of the 2020 campaign.

Lawmakers had been compiling a fresh package of bills after special counsel Robert Mueller’s findings in the Trump-Russia probe. But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Democrats are now pushing ahead with votes because it’s part of “what the American people elected us to do.”

It remains to be seen if passage of bills through the House will break the stalemate in Congress over what to do about election security.

Democrats sped up their efforts after Trump suggested Wednesday in an interview with ABC News that he was open to accepting a foreign power’s help in his 2020 campaign. He appeared to walk those comments back Friday, telling Fox News that “of course” he would go to the FBI or the attorney general if a foreign power offered him dirt about an opponent.

The House bills seek to secure state election systems, put stricter limits on foreign election interference and provide more oversight of the executive branch, according to aides familiar with the legislation. The House could vote as soon as this week on the first bill in the package, a series of measures to improve state election systems with paper ballots, audits and funding of grants to states.

Rep. John Sarbanes, D-Md., among those leading the effort, said Trump’s attitude toward foreign interference was “breathtaking,” and, he believes, the president is taking the country in the “opposite direction of where the public wants to go, which is to feel more confident, not less confident” in the vote.

Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, tried to pass a bill on the Senate floor Thursday that would require campaigns to report any contacts from foreign nationals intending to interfere in a presidential election. But Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., objected, blocking it from passage.

Trump appeared to praise Blackburn for the move Friday, tweeting that Democrats “continue to look for a do-over on the Mueller Report.”

Warner tweeted back: “The President is making it quite clear that he wants the Senate GOP to obstruct any attempt to prevent future foreign election interference.”

Nancy Pelosi