Tag: election security

Private money helped pay to conduct Minnesota’s election

Minnesota’s election directors say private money fueled by donations from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg helped them successfully execute an election threatened by safety concerns amid the coronavirus pandemic, an avalanche of early arriving ballots, and President Donald Trump’s repeated attempts to undermine the legitimacy of voting by mail.

The Chicago-based nonprofit Center for Tech and Civic Life delivered grants to election offices in more than 2,500 jurisdictions across the country — including 28 Minnesota cities and counties. View the post and listen here.

China, Iran targeting presidential campaigns with hacking attempts, Google announces

Washington Post logoChinese and Iranian government hackers have targeted the Gmail accounts of staffers working on the presidential campaigns of Joe Biden and President Trump, respectively, Google announced Thursday.

There were no signs the accounts were compromised, a Google threat analyst said in a tweet Thursday, and law enforcement was notified.

The disclosure is a fresh reminder that nation states are actively seeking to gain access to presidential campaigns — a practice that has taken place in every presidential election dating back more than a decade. Continue reading.

Congress set for clash over surveillance reforms

The Hill logoCongress is gearing up for a high-profile fight over reauthorizing a handful of controversial surveillance programs months before the 2020 elections.

After punting late last year to give themselves more time to negotiate, lawmakers now have 15 working days to figure out whether and how to reauthorize expiring provisions of the USA Freedom Act by the March 15 deadline.

The policy battle comes as tensions are already running high in Washington after a weeks-long fight emanating from the Justice Department — which will also be at the center of the surveillance discussion — and with the November elections injecting a higher dose of politics into any discussion involving Congress and President Trump. 

You can join the effort to expose Twitter bots

In the lead-up to the 2018 midterm elections, more than 10,000 automated Twitter accounts got caught conducting a coordinated campaign of tweets to discourage people from voting. These automated accounts may seem authentic to some, but a tool called Botometer was able to identify them while they pretentiously argued and agreed, for example, that “democratic men who vote drown out the voice of women.” We are part of the team that developed this tool that detects the bot accounts on social media.

Our next effort, called BotSlayer, is aimed at helping journalists and the general public spot these automated social media campaigns while they are happening.

It’s the latest step in our research laboratory’s work over the past few years. At Indiana University’s Observatory on Social Media, we are uncovering and analyzing how false and misleading information spreads online.

View the complete November 27 article by Pik-Mai Hui, Ph.D. Student in Information and Network Science at Indiana University, and Christopher Torres-Lugo, Ph.D. Student in Computer Science at Indiana University, on the Conversation website here.

Minnesota state and federal officials are teaming up to close a big gap in laws meant to protect victims of domestic violence

The Minnesota secretary of state’s office is known for elections. Voter registration. Election security.

Less well known is another function administered by the office: The Safe at Home program, an address confidentiality program created in 2007 for survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking. When someone is enrolled, the program assigns those who enroll a P.O. box that they can use as their legal address.

While 37 other states have established similar address confidentiality programs, some federal agencies refuse to acknowledge Safe at Home P.O. boxes. That inconsistency prompted Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon to work with Rep. Betty McCollum, of Minnesota’s Fourth District, to create a federal Safe at Home Act, a bipartisan bill and joint effort with officials in Missouri that would standardize how federal agencies deal with Safe at Home mailboxes.

View the complete October 23 article by Gabe Schneider on the MinnPost website here.

Rep. Phillips Statement on Mitch McConnell Backing $250 Million in Election Security Funding

WASHINGTON, DC – Rep. Dean Phillips (MN-03) released the following statement on Mitch McConnell’s decision to support providing states with $250 million in election security funding:

“There is an urgent need to restore public trust in our government, and that means elected officials must act in the public interest. Senator McConnell’s change of heart is welcome news, but far more needs to be done to secure our elections from foreign interference. The House passed the SAFE Act in June that would provide the level of robust funding our states actually need to secure their election systems. We need verifiable paper ballots all over the country that can be efficiently monitored. And we need to comprehensively address other avenues for election interference – with bills like Senator Klobuchar’s bipartisan HONEST Ads Act. Senator McConnell can and should support all of these efforts.

This is a beginning. I invite Senator McConnell to engage with members of both political parties and continue the work of protecting our democracy. The American people are counting on us to put politics aside and do the right thing.”

Sen. Ron Wyden is tired of Republicans ignoring election security

The Oregon Democrat wants to lift the issue out of the “traditional Washington bicker fest.”

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) is tired of Republicans ignoring election security.

“[W]hat happened in 2016 could be really small potatoes compared to 2020,” said Wyden, an Oregon Democrat who sits on the Intelligence Committee.

Wyden is especially concerned that, as he said, “all of the political muscle is on the other side trying to protect the status quo.” Now he’s hoping to take his message straight to voters.

View the complete May 22 article by Joshua Eaton on the ThinkProgress website here.

Why hasn’t Minnesota approved election security funding yet?

Minnesota is the only state not to be making use of federal election security funding.

The security of U.S. elections in 2020 is under the microscope in the wake of Russian interference in 2016, so how come Minnesota is yet to approve federal funding to protect its voting systems?

Maintaining the integrity of Minnesota’s 2020 elections is considered to be of paramount importance by DFL Secretary of State Steve Simon, and there is $6.6 million available to the state via The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) to do so.

The HAVA allocates federal funding to states for election security, voter registration privacy, accessibility improvements and election training. Minnesota is the only state in the nation that has yet to allocate 2018 HAVA dollars, in part because it is one of the only states that requires the Legislature to approve these funds.

View the complete May 14 article by Madeline Deninger on the Bring Me the News website here.

Speaker Hortman on Quickly Passing Legislation to Access Help America Vote Funds

Yesterday, Speaker Hortman gave the attached letter to Senator Gazelka outlining the House’s interest in quickly passing legislation to allow the Secretary of State to access the full amount of federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) funds available.

View the letter below:

Sen. Klobuchar and Sen. Sullivan Introduce Bipartisan Legislation to Strengthen Election Security with International Allies

The Global Electoral Exchange Act would establish an international information sharing program on election security at the State Department

WASHINGTON- U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Dan Sullivan (R-AK) introduced bipartisan legislation to share election security information with our international allies. The Global Electoral Exchange Act would establish an international information sharing program on election security at the State Department. The program would allow for the U.S. and our international allies to exchange ideas related to best practices on issues like audits, disinformation campaigns, voter database protections and other issues critical to election administration. The bill also authorizes the State Department to provide grants to U.S. nonprofit organizations that specialize in election security and election administration for the purpose of exchanging information with similar organizations in partner countries.

“Election security is national security. Our intelligence community continues to warn that our elections—and those of our allies—are a target for adversaries,” Klobuchar said. “This bipartisan legislation will allow the State Department to work with our allies abroad to share information, discuss best practices, and combat the growing threat of election interference to democracies around the world.”

“The threats to our democratic electoral process and those of other democracies across the globe should not be taken lightly,” Sullivan said. “This legislation takes important steps to enhance collaboration between the United States and our allies to examine best practices and ensure future elections remain fair, free and absent of foreign interference.”

Continue reading “Sen. Klobuchar and Sen. Sullivan Introduce Bipartisan Legislation to Strengthen Election Security with International Allies”