Shane KiteAll six U.S. intelligence chiefs agreed today at a Senate hearing on global risks that Russia is working to interfere in the 2018 midterm elections by sowing divisions among Americans on hot-button issues via social media and other means, and they reconfirmed their agencies’ conclusions that Moscow interfered in the 2016 presidential race.
“We expect Russia to continue using propaganda, social media, false-flag personas, sympathetic spokespeople and other means of influence to try to exacerbate social and political fissures in the United States,” said Daniel R. Coats, director of national intelligence (DNI) in an opening statement.
The intelligence chiefs heard pleas from Maine’s Independent Sen. Angus King to get President Trump to acknowledge Moscow’s continued meddling in U.S. elections as a threat to American democracy. The president has yet to address the ongoing Russian threat to U.S. elections nor outlined plans to stop it.
He “hasn’t even tweeted a single concern,” said Mark Warner, democratic vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which held today’s hearing.
The president has been reluctant to acknowledge Russia’s influence campaign on the election he won in 2016, except to claim it had no effect on the election’s results.
That reluctance comes against the backdrop of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Trump and other top White House officials for potential collusion with Moscow regarding Russian interference in the 2016 election, as well as potential obstruction of the probe itself. Trump and those officials deny any collusion or obstruction took place.
The assessment that Moscow will continue to run covert campaigns to influence U.S. elections is an assertion shared by key members of President Trump’s administration, as well as the intelligence community and Congress.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said last week without elaborating that Russia was already meddling in the 2018 midterms.
Sen. King urged the intelligence chiefs to get Trump to understand the issue as a recurring national security threat that must be dealt with, but one that can be addressed separate from matters involving the special counsel.
“I understand the president’s sensitivity about whether his campaign was in connection with the Russians, but that’s a separate question,” King said. “But there is no question – we’ve got before us the entire intelligence community – that the Russians interfered in the election in 2016; they’re continuing to do it, and they’re a real imminent threat to our elections in a matter of 8 or 9 months.”
The president’s aggressive efforts to paint the multiple probes into Russian election meddling as unwarranted and biased has resulted in King’s constituents coming up with their own false conclusions about the investigations.
“My problem is: I talk to people in Maine who say, ‘The whole thing is a witch hunt and a hoax because the president told me.’
“I just wish you all could persuade the president as a matter of national security to separate these two issues – the collusion issue is over here, unresolved; we’ll get to the bottom of that. But we cannot confront this threat, which is a serious one, with a whole of government response, when the leader of the government continues to deny it exists.”
King had said earlier he felt “sorrow” over the president’s silence on the issue: “The factual statement, that the Russians are a continuing threat to this country all of you have agreed to: If only the president would say that.”
Tillerson told Fox News last week that the U.S. remained unprepared to deal with Russia’s continued efforts to interfere in American elections.
“I don’t know that I would say we are better prepared, because the Russians will adapt as well,” Tillerson said. “The point is, if it’s their intention to interfere, they are going to find ways to do that. We can take steps we can take but this is something that, once they decide they are going to do it, it’s very difficult to preempt it.
“I think it’s important we just continue to say to Russia, ‘Look, you think we don’t see what you’re doing. We do see it and you need to stop. If you don’t, you’re going to just continue to invite consequences for yourself.’”
Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., asked each U.S. intelligence head whether the president had directed them and their agencies to take specific actions to “blunt” Russian influence operations.
“Not as specifically directed by the president,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray.
CIA Director Michael Pompeo said he was “not sure how specific,” but added later there was “a big broad effort” to push back against political meddling, but that “it’s not just the Russian threat; it’s the Iranians, it’s the Chinese…”
NSA Director Michael Rogers said: “I can’t say that I’ve been explicitly directed to, quote, ‘blunt or actively stop.’ On the other hand,” he said, “it’s very clear: generate knowledge and insight, help us understand this so that we can generate better policy. That direction has been very explicit, in fairness.”
“But,” Reed interjected, “collecting intelligence, and acting on it, are two very different things.”
“I’d agree,” Rogers said. “But I’d also argue: What’s our role as intelligence professionals in all this?”
Under the law, the president defines their role, because he directs or signs off on covert intelligence operations, and prioritizes intelligence activities in general.
