Defending California’s ballot
The outcome of several California congressional races this November could decide the composition of the U.S. House of Representatives — and the political direction of the country. So Alex Padilla, California’s Democratic Secretary of State, is wise to take the threat of election cybersecurity seriously.
It would help if Congress did the same.
The dangers of election hacking are real. Last year, national security officials revealed that Russian hackers attempted to break into 21 states’ election systems in 2016. One of those states was California.
While there was no evidence found that hackers were successful at compromising the integrity of California’s votes, they were, of course, successful at hacking the email systems of the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign ahead of the presidential election.
The debate about whether this election hacking affected the outcome of the 2016 presidential election will likely last for years.
What the vast majority of Americans should agree on is that allowing foreign actors to influence the outcome of our elections is a threat to every American.
Unfortunately, it could happen again.
In July, Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., said that Russian hackers had been caught trying to infiltrate her Senate office. McCaskill, who’s one of the most vulnerable Senate Democrats seeking reelection, said the hackers had been unsuccessful.
Still, the news, along with the attempt’s apparent similarities to the 2016 Democratic National Committee hack, was more than enough to alarm election security experts. In California, Padilla said he’s not going to take any chances.
“We’ve done a top-tobottom review of our systems since November 2016, and we’re preparing for California to be a (hacking) target again,” Padilla said.
Padilla emphasized that securing California’s elections means more than just securing voting machines (although that’s very important). It also means training county and state election staff. It also means — in an age of social media-enabled misinformation campaigns — communicating facts to the public.
Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature have done their part to contribute to California’s election security, approving $134 million in funding in June to upgrade county voting systems and improve election cyber-defense.
But so far, Congress has been stingy with federal funding. That’s dangerous in a time of proven cybersecurity threats and a bipartisan consensus that the states need ample resources ahead of this year’s election. If Americans are to believe in the integrity of their votes, Congress needs to act.