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An infographic of the changes to the US voting system under Trump's executive order
Graphic Truth: How Trump aims to alter the US voting system
Officials from the Democratic Party in 19 states have filed a lawsuit challenging Donald Trump’s efforts to alter the national voting process via an executive order entitled “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections,” which they argue infringes upon states’ constitutional rights to manage their elections. The Trump administration argues that it is necessary to ensure election security.
How has Trump changed voting? Under the order signed on March 25, people must prove their citizenship to register to vote. This could affect 21.3 million Americans who don’t have proof of citizenship readily available. It also requires these documents to be shown to an election official in person, effectively eliminating online voter registration. The in-person documentation stipulation could make it harder for military and overseas voters to participate in elections.
Administratively, Trump’s order prohibits states from counting ballots received after Election Day, even if they were postmarked before. It also decertifies all voting machines nationwide, requiring that they be recertified under a stricter standard that none of them currently meet. According to the Brennan Center, it will cost states billions of dollars to upgrade their voting machines to comply before the 2026 midterms.
Finally, the order says that money from the federal government will be withheld if the citizenship requirement is not upheld and if the Department of Government Efficiency is not given access to voter information to ensure that noncitizens are not voting.
Who would this affect the most? The order’s narrow list of acceptable identification would require most Americans to use a passport to register. But less than half of Americans have a passport, and younger people, people of color, and those with lower incomes are less likely to have easy access to identification documents. Only 38% of Republicans have passports compared to 41% of all Americans. Additionally, many married women who have changed their last names may not have citizenship documents that reflect their current legal names.
Trump’s executive order has drawn heavy criticism, with many arguing it oversteps presidential authority and tramples on states’ rights to control their own elections. Legal challenges are piling up, and most experts think it’s only a matter of time before the Supreme Court gets involved.
CISA chief warns of rise of disinformation, election meddling after Nov 5
After January 6, 2021, what once was just a formality became a high-stakes period. Jen Easterly, the nation's top election security official, fears that the real threat to American democracy and stability may come during that crucial period between when votes are cast on Nov 5 and when they're certified, on January 6. "My concern, Ian, is that between November 5th and January 6th—when the Congress is going to certify the vote—our foreign adversaries are going to go hog wild." Easterly, the Director of the Center for Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, spoke with Ian Bremmer on GZERO World.
Watch full episode: Top threats to US election security
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).
Top threats to US election security
As Election Day approaches, US cybersecurity chief Jen Easterly warns that while America’s voting systems are more secure than ever, the period between voting and certification remains vulnerable, with foreign adversaries poised to exploit any internal divisions during this critical time.
In a wide-ranging interview with Ian Bremmer on GZERO World before Election Day, Easterly, the director of Homeland Security's Center for Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, discussed the massive improvements to the nation’s voting systems and emphasized: “with great confidence that election infrastructure has never been more secure.”
However, as for that sensitive period, after votes are counted and reported but before they are officially certified, Easterly is much more concerned. "Between November 5th and January 6th—when the Congress is going to certify the vote—our foreign adversaries are going to go hog wild.” She points to intelligence that Russia, China, Iran, and other US adversaries will be waiting to exploit any internal divisions. But they can only exploit what is already there, and if 2020 taught us anything, it is that the certification of election results is far from a formality. Can we hold it together long enough to peacefully transfer power? Let's hope that this election cycle past is not prologue.
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
New digital episodes of GZERO World are released every Monday on YouTube. Don't miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO's YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).
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US election security and the threats of foreign interference: CISA Director Jen Easterly discusses
Listen: On the GZERO World podcast, Ian Bremmer sits down with Jen Easterly, the top US official behind America’s election security infrastructure. As Director of Homeland Security's Center for Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), she is on the frontlines of safeguarding the voting process. In their conversation, Easterly talks about the massive improvements to the nation’s voting systems and emphasizes “with great confidence that election infrastructure has never been more secure.” Yet what worries Easterly is the potential for election meddling and disinformation after voting ends and before certification is complete.
Easterly discusses how the "firehose of disinformation" can have serious consequences on the country. She calls out Trump and other political leaders who have peddled false narratives pushed by foreign actors—a move that risks eroding public trust in our democracy. Again, though, her main concern is for that volatile period after the votes are cast and before they're certified. She argues that "between November 5th and January 6th—when the Congress is going to certify the vote—our foreign adversaries are going to go hog wild.” In particular, threats coming from Russia, China, and Iran. So as voters head to the polls, Easterly and her agency are making it a priority to rebuild trust and confidence with American voters.
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published.
Transcript: US election security and the threats of foreign interference: CISA Director Jen Easterly discusses
Ian Bremmer:
Hello and welcome to the GZERO World Podcast. This is where you can find extended versions of my conversations on public television. I'm Ian Bremmer, and the time has come. The months of campaign chaos and confusion are over. Election Day is just around the corner. And believe me when I tell you, I cannot wait for us to be done with this. But are we ready? Are we ready to process millions of votes freely and fairly so that come election night or week or month, we'll be confident in proclaiming a winner? My guest today says you should take a chill pill, we got this.
Jen Easterly:
The reality is that election infrastructure has never been more secure and the election stakeholder community never better prepared to run free, fair, safe, secure elections.
Ian Bremmer:
Jen Easterly is the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency or CISA for short. And from a technical standpoint, America's electoral process is solid. It's decentralized. There are paper backups, polling monitors, fallback plans. Things will go wrong. They always do. But as a nation, we know how to run elections. But people will tell you perception is reality. And when it comes to public confidence in our voting systems, fewer Americans have faith in our electoral system than ever before. About 6 in 10, according to Gallup. Russia, China, Iran all have vested interest in sowing distrust and discord in America's voting system. But they're doing more than just watching and waiting, they're actively interfering. And that's what I want to talk about today with my guest, CISA director, Jen Easterly. I also want to dig into what happens after all votes are cast and counted. Remember what happened last time, January 6th, and all that? So let's get to it. Jen Easterly, great to have you back on the show.
Jen Easterly:
So exciting.
Ian Bremmer:
So look, we have a lot of people in the United States right now that are losing their minds over the state of democracy, and in particular, this election. You are personally doing more than any human being I know in this country to try to help ensure that our election is indeed free, fair, not interfered with. Explain that, please.
Jen Easterly:
So it's great to be with you. Look, folks may not know that in the aftermath of Russian attempts to interfere in the presidential election in 2016, election infrastructure which was not considered critical infrastructure before, was actually designated as critical infrastructure, and CISA was designated as the federal government lead for election infrastructure security. So that means that we bring the federal government resources and intelligence and capabilities to state and local election officials who of course run elections. So that's been eight years in. And over that eight years, there has been a massive improvement in the security and resilience of our election infrastructure. I can tell you over the last three plus years, I have traveled the country working with election officials of both parties, and I have seen firsthand how tirelessly they work to ensure that every vote is counted as cast. I can say with great confidence that election infrastructure has never been more secure.
But I think it's important why I say that. We got to look at the facts. So first of all, to prevent digital interference, got to remember, voting systems not connected to the internet. Second, to prevent digital manipulation, over 97% paper ballots. That really matters. And to guarantee zero human manipulation, election officials have put in place multiple layers of safeguards, cybersecurity, physical access controls to protect election infrastructure from compromise. And that includes pre-election testing of equipment, post-election audits. So no matter who you vote for, you can have confidence that your vote will be counted as cast.
Ian Bremmer:
So many people see their ballots, it looks like an old-timey system. It looks a little antiquated. You're saying actually by design we need this to be physical infrastructure. Your vote is indeed safe and secure in the United States.
Jen Easterly:
Absolutely. But it's important to recognize, states by the constitution, they run elections. And every state does it a bit differently. The saying goes, if you've seen one state's election, you've seen one state's election, different equipment, different processes. But the diverse and decentralized nature of our election infrastructure is actually a tremendous strength because it means that it is not possible for a bad actor to tamper with or manipulate our voting infrastructure in a way where you could have a material impact on the outcome of the presidential election, certainly, not without being detected. So yes, there are different equipment in every state, but think about that diversity as a source of resilience.
Ian Bremmer:
Resilience in terms of resistance to international interference. But the fact that you have 50 different state governments running 50 different systems can create very different ways of counting the ballots, very different ways of who is allowed to vote and how easily. I mean, this is a significant challenge when it comes to the ultimate integrity of an election.
Jen Easterly:
Well, you're probably referring to non-citizen voting, which-
Ian Bremmer:
As only one example. Yeah.
Jen Easterly:
... has been a big issue. I'll tell you one reason why it's been a big issue, why I blame for it, and that's the Russians. The Russians have picked up on this specific narrative as something that they can use to essentially spew propaganda that divides Americans. Their goal is to undermine trust and the legitimacy of our elections and to pit Americans against each other. Look, what Americans need to know about this. It is a crime for non-citizens to vote. A federal crime that is punishable by prison, deportation, and a permanent bar to citizenship. Second, election officials forever have had multiple layers of systems and processes in place to ensure voter eligibility and the accuracy of voter rolls. And the important thing to know is, it's working. So the data actually shows that non-citizen voting is exceptionally rare. Just look at Georgia. So Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger just announced last week what he called the most comprehensive citizenship audit. You know what they found? Out of 8.2 million voters in Georgia, 9 non-citizens voted, .0001%.
Ian Bremmer:
Georgia, a red state that recently went blue. But Raffensperger we're talking about was a Republican-elected official. I am saying that not because it should matter, but just so people understand.
Jen Easterly:
Yeah. Your point is a good one because at the end of the day, elections are political, election security is not. We do need to recognize that. It's not a Republican issue, it's not a Democratic issue, it's an American issue. Election security is national security. But look at more broadly, Heritage Foundation, their fraud database from 2002 to 2023, 85 cases of non-citizen voting among 2 billion. Okay, so I strongly believe that one non-citizen voting is one too many. But at the end of the day, the evidence shows this is exceptionally rare and certainly not at the scale where it could have an impact on the outcome of the presidential election. But the Russians want us to think it is and we cannot allow them to have a vote in our democracy.
Ian Bremmer:
Now, to be fair, it does appear that a lot of American citizens are interested in it being an issue as well. I mean, we have seen efforts to put legislation in place in Congress. I assume these are not uneducated people in Congress that are doing it. They understand that this is something that is agitating American citizens as well.
Jen Easterly:
Yeah. So at the end of the day, election officials have taken multiple steps for years, regularly reviewing the rolls to ensure the accuracy and voter eligibility, and the evidence shows that non-citizen voting is exceptionally rare. I won't speak to the politics of this, but what I think is really important-
Ian Bremmer:
And you're not a political official, you are a nonpartisan appointed official.
Jen Easterly:
And we are non-partisan, non-political agency. We work with election officials of both parties to ensure they have what they need to defend their infrastructure. I will say, Ian, look, at the end of the day we're talking about the foundation of our democracy. And I think it is dishonest and frankly really irresponsible for anybody in a position of power or authority, regardless of party or politics, to be spreading inaccurate information that undermines American trust in our election infrastructure. It's corrosive to our democracy. It does the work of our foreign adversaries for them. And oh, by the way, it is leading to very real physical threats to election officials of both parties.
Ian Bremmer:
Across the country.
Jen Easterly:
Across the country.
Ian Bremmer:
Is it fair to say right now that there is unprecedented amounts of disinformation being circulated about the election and the election process, both by external actors and internal in the United States for this election? Is that fair to say?
Jen Easterly:
I think it's fair to say. I have talked a lot about this firehose of disinformation. And we are very focused. And frankly, I think it's a good news story because we've been working very closely with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines, and the FBI to bring together the federal government to put out so much information about what our foreign adversaries are doing. You saw this playbook with Ukraine. So a lot of intelligence now being declassified so that we can get it to the American people so they understand what the Russians, what the Iranians, what the Chinese are doing to influence Americans to undermine our confidence in the election and to stoke partisan discord. We've been putting out these updates for months, and most recently we've talked about what may happen after November 5th. Because as you know, when the polls close, the election is not over.
So very, very focused on our foreign adversaries. But at the end of the day, what we're trying to do is to ensure that Americans know the accurate information. We're not going to fight all of this crazy disinformation out there, but what we can try and do is make sure that Americans who want to know, who have questions about how their vote is protected, how they can be sure that their vote is counted as cast, where to go, and that is your state or local election official. They are the experts. They're the ones who run elections and can tell you all of the steps that they take to protect your vote.
Ian Bremmer:
So I'll get to after the election, but I still want to cover the run-up here. So another issue that is getting a lot of attention now is voter ID. In an environment where you are saying literally virtually no non-citizens, virtually no people that aren't supposed to vote are actually voting. And we've done that auditing, we've done it across the country in red states and blue states. 84% of Americans believe that there should be voter ID. As someone who is responsible for election security, what can you say to inform that debate?
Jen Easterly:
So look, states run elections. I think there are probably 35 out of 50 states that do require some sort of photo ID. But states run elections, and because a state does not require a photo ID does not mean that they don't have multiple ways to verify the eligibility of that voter. While states run things differently, it is illegal in every state. It is a federal crime punishable by prison for non-citizens to vote. And I think we have to trust that our election officials who are invested in the security and integrity of their vote... Regardless of party, every election official wants to run a safe and secure and free, and fair election. They work tirelessly to ensure it's only eligible voters. And the way that every state does that may be different, but I know the processes are in place to ensure that there is integrity.
Ian Bremmer:
Now, irrespective of all of the integrity that we have around the election, there have certainly been some shenanigans, and in the run-up. I'm thinking number one, you've already alluded to the fact that a number of election officials have received physical threats to themselves, to their families, making it very difficult for them to effectively do their job. Secondly, we have just seen two incidences of arson of ballot boxes where potentially significant numbers of ballots have been spoiled, in areas that have been very close in the last election opening to question whether or not the outcome of those local elections are going to actually be free and fair. We've also seen all sorts of videos and posts including deepfakes. One I saw about people ripping up ballots in Pennsylvania that we know was actually not true, but a whole bunch of people in the United States saw it and believed it at the time. Talk about what you have seen and experienced of those and of others that give you reason for concern.
Jen Easterly:
So those are all really important things and I actually want to break them down because I think they're important examples of what we're seeing and what's being done. So for example, in Bucks County, there was-
Ian Bremmer:
In Pennsylvania.
Jen Easterly:
In Pennsylvania, there was a video that purported to show ballots being destroyed. Bucks County very smartly came out right away and said, this is a fake video. Evidence of a crime, they're investigating it. And then the federal government in shocking agility came out a day later.
Ian Bremmer:
I mean, within days.
Jen Easterly:
Came out a day later, put a statement together based on a forensic analysis of the video saying Russians had created this and are spreading this. So this is Russian propaganda. And we will continue to put out information where we see it's coming from our foreign adversaries. But again, the state and local election officials have a very important role in terms of communicating around that. So that's an important example. Separately, there was fraudulent ballots in Lancaster County. So that you had again election officials-
Ian Bremmer:
Also, Pennsylvania.
Jen Easterly:
Also, Pennsylvania.
Ian Bremmer:
Oh my god. We know how important that state is to the outcome in particular. So the Russians are not picking Pennsylvania randomly here.
Jen Easterly:
No. But that process worked. You had election officials come out, they had identified it. They're investigating it as evidence of a crime and the criminals will be held accountable. Going to Washington and Oregon, you just talked about the two incendiary devices. So I was just on the phone today with the Secretary of State in Washington. They're working with local law enforcement, they're working with the FBI to find the criminals who are responsible for this activity to ensure that they are held accountable. But they are also reaching out to potentially impacted voters to make sure they understand if they were impacted, how to get that replacement ballot. All of this to say, so I say election infrastructure is more secure and more resilient than ever. Part of that is because there are processes in place to deal with these inevitable disruptions. I mean, Ian, we're talking about a very complex event, hundreds of thousands of election workers, tens of thousands of polling places, some 150 million people or more voting.
There will be disruptions, there will be incidents. The important thing for the American people need to know is that these incidents, while they are disruptive, they will not impact the security and integrity of the vote. Election officials have multiple processes in place to ensure that they are able to verify the votes that come in and ensure that every voter that is eligible casts a ballot and that ballot is counted as cast. I do want to go back to your point about physical threats because this is something that bothers me a lot. I spent most of my career in the army. I have been downranged multiple times, served the nation, and nothing is more precious to America than our ability to vote. It's the golden thread of our democracy. You've seen these very real physical threats to election officials. Swatting, harassment, bullying, threats of violence to election officials of both parties and their families, largely stemming from these claims of fraud.
And we have to remember, these election officials are not some faceless bureaucrats. They are our friends, they're our neighbors, they're family members. They're in our community every day. And they ain't doing it for pay or fame or glory. They're doing it because they believe in our democracy. And they deserve to be respected, they deserve to be supported, and they damn well deserve to be safe. So all of us should keep that in mind when we're voting. We should thank those election officials and be grateful for what they're doing.
Ian Bremmer:
On Election Day, what do we do to try to ensure that there are not disruptions, that people are not intimidated that prevent them from going to their place of vote, that make them feel unsafe? I mean, again, clearly, in this kind of toxic environment where we've already seen this level of willingness to talk about violence and maybe threaten violence, you can understand that people in some areas are going to feel a little vulnerable.
Jen Easterly:
I say a couple of things. First of all, there has been early voting, which is fantastic, so people can get out there and vote now. You don't necessarily have to vote on Election Day. There's a lot of mail-in voting that is available. But I don't want to discourage voters or make voters feel scared or intimidated. The threats have been to election workers and to election facilities. Voters have been going to polling places and there have not been any significant disruptions that we have been tracking. So I want voters to actually be joyful, to be excited, and hopeful. There's a chance to pick a new president. It's exciting. At the end of the day, what people should understand is because election officials had to deal with some of this after 2020, there are now well-worn processes in place to ensure that they're prepared for any sort of threat.
We have worked with them to do drills around bomb threats, around active shooters, to put de-escalation techniques in place if there's fomenting violence around an election office location. So the other thing is, election officials have been working very closely with local law enforcement, which are really going to play an important role in any sort of protests or violence that happens after Election Day. So I don't want voters to feel scared or intimidated about exercising the most important thing you do in this democracy. There is a lot of layers of physical security in place to protect.
Ian Bremmer:
Now, you and I have spoken a lot about all of these things offline. And I do believe that you have very good reason to feel confident about the security of the process of the election. And that's why I wanted you have on the show and have an opportunity to talk to Americans about that.
Jen Easterly:
Thank you.
Ian Bremmer:
After the election is over the fact is that a staggering number of Americans don't believe you. They don't. And there are many reasons for that. Some of them are external, some of them are inside the United States, some of them are in positions of power. What worries you the most about the post-November 5 environment this time around in the United States?
Jen Easterly:
I will just tell you, I think you're probably right about Americans not believing maybe the federal government. I did see a poll that was published in The Times yesterday that was pretty encouraging to me that said some 80% of those polled, Republicans, Democrats, and independents actually have confidence in the integrity of our elections, which it surprised me that it was that high. I don't know if that is an outlier or something. Certainly, if you listen to a lot of the zeitgeist, you see questioning about the security and integrity of our elections. But I hope that that is a good sign for people being willing to accept the outcome of elections. Now, to your specific question-
Ian Bremmer:
Okay, that's probably the most positive poll that I've seen on that specific question, to be clear.
Jen Easterly:
As you know, I'm an acolyte of the Ted Lasso school of politics and the world. I have to believe in the goodness. But look, we are very attuned to the fact that the elections are not over when the polls close. At the end of the day, the results that folks will see are unofficial results. And in the battleground states, it could be a razor-thin margin just as it was in 2020, and it could take a couple of days to get that count where there is confidence and the accuracy. And that's what the American people want. They want an accurate count. The great news is, in every one of those battleground states, there are paper records. So there will be a result, a paper record that can be counted and recounted and audited to ensure accuracy just as it was in 2020. Now, I know people don't want to hear this, but the American people might have to be patient to get an accurate result.
Ian Bremmer:
And just like you said, that very, very few non-citizens vote. When we see recounts and when we see challenges, we're also seeing a comparatively tiny number of votes that end up changing. We've seen plenty of cases around this historically.
Jen Easterly:
Yeah, absolutely. And I mean that's the process at work. Election officials have done this before. They've gone through these processes, they know what they're doing. And one of the other issues that's worth bringing up if people have questions about it has been hand count versus count of electronic machines. People saying, "We don't want computers touching ballots. We want to go back to hand counts." Well, there's a reason why we use machines. It's because it's been proven that humans are not good at repetitive, tedious tasks like counting large amounts of ballots. It is much faster, much more accurate, and much cheaper to the taxpayer to actually use these machines to count the votes.
And so people should have confidence that the voting infrastructure has been developed in such a way that it is protected from compromise. It's actually much more accurate than hand counts. But because you have paper records, you can take a certain subset of those ballots to actually make sure that it lines up with what the machines are telling you. Again, these processes are in place. So my concern though, Ian, is between November 5th and frankly probably January 6th when the Congress is going to certify the vote, our foreign adversaries are going to go hog wild.
Ian Bremmer:
Not just our foreign adversaries, there's good reason to believe that a lot of domestic actors are going to go hog wild.
Jen Easterly:
I agree with you. Now, from a federal government perspective, again, nonpartisan, nonpolitical agency, we need to recognize that some of what we see from domestic actors, that is all protected speech. So I think where the concern is, is what we saw for example in the indictment that DOJ announced where Russian actor who were indicted were actually funneling nearly $10 million to a platform in the US so that unwitting Americans were spewing Russian propaganda. So we may not see it because the Russians and the Iranians and the Chinese are using cutouts and commercial firms and marketing firms to basically hide their hand and launder their propaganda. So at the end of the day, it could be coming from people here, it could be coming from our foreign adversaries, but it will be likely a lot of disinformation designed to foment unrest. And so that's why election officials have done so much preparation to ensure the protection of the ballots, the protection of the election facilities. That's why law enforcement at the local level is going to play such an important role.
But look, people should actually feel good about the fact that we know what happened in 2020, and from a disinformation perspective, we know what happened after the hurricanes. And so it's not like we're not prepared for this. Election officials have been preparing for this for years. We actually ran nearly 200 tabletop exercises to take election officials through all manner of potential disruptions. Whether that is a violent protest or a bomb threat or ransomware or a deepfake video or anything that could be disruptive, I can tell you election officials have never been better prepared to meet this moment, and that's why I say I have such great confidence.
Ian Bremmer:
There are two moments that have to be met. You essentially have to do two jobs. You have to ensure election security from the ballots all the way to the result, but you also have to actively fight the disinformation so that people believe that that process was indeed legitimate. And I would argue that the latter is a lot harder than the former, especially because some of it is protected speech, especially because some of it is promoted by, for example, the former president. Some of it is promoted by the wealthiest person in the United States and the world, with a significant platform.
Now, you are a nonpartisan official. I am certainly not going to ask you to opine on them as people, but I do want you to talk about what you do in an environment where you feel like the process has gone perfectly well but actually, the information environment in the United States is exactly the opposite. And patriotic Americans believe that the way to uphold the system is to overturn the election because we've seen that before and we could easily see that again.
Jen Easterly:
So you're talking about the technical hacking where I am completely confident that our election infrastructure is protected versus the perception hacking. And you're right, that is a harder problem, especially because we are now in an incredibly fractured information environment. So in terms of what we do at CISA, two things. So first, when it comes to a major source of this disinformation, which is our foreign adversaries, we are working to be able to understand their tactics, identify them, ensure the American people understand what our adversaries are doing, and disrupt. So you've seen that from the rest of the government. You've seen it from DOJ, you've seen it from Treasury and Sanctions. That is an important role. We do not want our foreign adversaries to have a vote in our democracy. Now, the other thing that we're doing, we have to make sure that Americans who want the accurate information know where to go. And that's why we are always pushing people to the state and local election officials.
There will be, granted, some people that don't really want to get that accurate information, and so they could go to other places. But I think it's really important if Americans... And I know all Americans, certainly folks listening, everybody cares about our country. Everybody cares about our democracy. And what's more important to our democracy than the integrity of the vote? And what really matters is the truth, the facts at the end of the day. And I get it, rage is interesting. Outrage gets people engaged, that's the whole thing. Enrage equals engage, and facts are boring. I get it. But at the end of the day, facts have never been more important to safeguarding and preserving our democracy. So what we're doing is amplifying the voices of state and local election officials. What people will hear and expect from me on Election Day and in the days after is being very out there.
In terms of communicating, we're going to have multiple media calls to ensure that we are getting out on all channels at the national level, at the local level to folks who want to understand can I actually have confidence that my vote was counted as cast. And you're absolutely right, it's harder to do this in an environment where the information is very polluted. But look, I believe that Americans want to ultimately protect and preserve what is most precious in our democracy, and that ultimately we will come together and we will see a peaceful transfer of power no matter who is elected, to continue to preserve our democracy.
Ian Bremmer:
So talk about foreign interference after the elections. We haven't talked very much about that. What should American voters be looking for? What should we be concerned about from foreign adversaries post-November 5th?
Jen Easterly:
Yeah, it's a great question. Because as you know, when the polls close, the elections are not over. All that voters will see, Americans will see are unofficial results. It actually takes a few days, in some cases, weeks to get the official results. But what we know is that, in the battleground states, it could be very close, meaning that there could be recounts, there may be audits just as happened in 2020. And so there could be a couple of days of uncertainty about who the winner is. And we know our foreign adversaries that are intent on stoking partisan discord, on undermining American confidence and legitimacy, and potentially inciting violence.
We know that they may take that window, that window of uncertainty and ambiguity where there's not a result, where there will be building anxiety among the American people. I mean, we know the stakes in this election are incredibly high, and so we will likely see foreign adversaries even more actively involved in influence narratives, in disinformation. And that's where Americans need to be patient, Americans need to go to those trusted sources, state and local election officials to understand exactly what's happening to protect their vote and get to a positive outcome.
Ian Bremmer:
I have gotten the sense from you that although there are a number of foreign actors that are actively engaged in the promotion of disinformation and the hacking of various candidates and their phones and all this sort of thing, give our audience a little bit of understanding of what the state of the art is right now.
Jen Easterly:
My point in Iran is, it's less about the state of the art that I'm going to talk to on generative AI. We know the Iranians want to assassinate the former president. That is a very real threat. They are involved-
Ian Bremmer:
Tried to kill Mike Pompeo as well the former Secretary of State.
Jen Easterly:
... in many officials. So we can't dismiss that. That is a very real threat from a capable, sophisticated foreign adversary. Now, they're also involved in malign influence operations and disinformation, but we can't dismiss what Iran is trying to do there. Now on Russia, I mean, it goes to the AI point that you and I have talked a lot about. AI is not a game-changer but it certainly is helping the Russians be more effective at the campaigns that they are doing. It's enabled them to create fake personas and fake websites in much more accelerated ways and very authentic-looking media that's not real. I mean, we were able to call out that fake video pretty rapidly. But at the end of the day, we don't know what we don't know because the information environment is just so convoluted. And so the thing that I would point to is just more activity and more sophisticated because some of these new capabilities. And that's Russia, it's also Iran-
Ian Bremmer:
They're spending more money than they did last time around, can you tell?
Jen Easterly:
I don't know how much money that they're spending, but from what we can tell... And again, folks that are interested, we just put up a webpage yesterday because we want America to know what our foreign adversaries are doing. And it talks about tactics and techniques and specific examples. So they're extremely active when you think about the past few years. And it's again, not just Russia, it's Iran, and it's China.
Ian Bremmer:
Are they phone banking at all, for example? Have we seen any of that?
Jen Easterly:
I have not seen evidence, but certainly one of the first exposures that was done was this AI-enabled bot form that was generating the fake social media persona. So they're very active. We need to know they're very active. And that's why at the end of the day... Look, if you want to get accurate information about your vote and how your vote is protected, and how you know that your vote is counted as cast, go to your state or local election official, it's the most important message. And how do you do that? There's vote.gov is a great source. The National Association of Secretaries of State, NASS.org, they have their TrustedInfo2024 campaign. You can come to CISA.gov where we have a lot of resources about everything that we're doing to protect the vote.
Look, Ian, as you know, there are a lot of threats out there. There are the physical threats we talked about, there are cyber threats, and there's very real threats from foreign malign adversaries who want to undermine Americans' confidence in our elections. But I want all of your viewers, and I want the American people to know that because of the massive amount of work that's been done over the past several years to specifically increase the security and resilience of our election infrastructure, that infrastructure has never been more secure, and election officials have never been better prepared to deliver safe and secure and free and fair elections. So Americans should feel good about that. They should feel good about casting their ballot, and they should feel good about having a voice in our democracy. A lot of threats, but election officials and the federal government, and the vendor community are prepared to meet this critical moment for America.
Ian Bremmer:
Jen Easterly, thanks so much for that.
Jen Easterly:
Thanks, Ian.
Ian Bremmer:
That's it for today's edition of the GZERO World podcast. Do you like what you heard? Of course, you do. Why not make it official? Why don't you rate and review GZERO World, only five stars, otherwise don't do it, on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts? Tell your friends.
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Countdown to the (possibly contested) US election
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take:
Normalcy is incrementally coming to the United States, if not yet to a lot of developing markets, but certainly to Europe, certainly to China. And I haven't spent a lot of time talking about the US election yet, certainly nothing close to the media coverage. I thought I would today because we've got 99 days until November 3rd. You say 100 days yesterday, sounds like a bigger deal, but that's only because we have a base 10 numeric system. If we had a base three numeric system, 99 days out would be pretty meaningful, right? But no, I thought let's finally, right, we've got these massive, incredibly expensive, billions of dollars spent, a year and a half of the entire process, I mean, by far a greater subversion of democracy, the way the US elections are held than any other advanced industrial democracy in the world. We all know it. Democrats, Republicans, people sick of the party system. We all recognize nothing can be done about it. It's fantastic for special interests that spend an immense amount of money trying to ensure that candidates do their bidding. But now that we are only 99 days out, political polls really do start to matter. We know who the candidates are on both sides. We don't yet have the V.P. on the Biden side. But still, I mean, we're pretty close. 100 days out, 99 days out, you feel like you can start paying attention.
So, what do I think? Well, first, you know, on the Trump side, it is very obvious that he is well behind in the polls. Let's keep in mind he was generally well behind in the polls in 2016. But this time around, not only do you have a candidate running against him that is not nearly as controversial or as toxic to a part of the population as Hillary Clinton was, but also just the general backdrop, conditions for an incumbent are really challenging. The economic contraction going on longer than a lot of the bankers and the economists have expected. You're talking about an 8% contraction likely or more of the US economy this year. Certainly, double digit unemployment, meaningful double-digit unemployment at the time that we have the election. Challenges in continuing to get stimulus in place, though, I do think this latest round four of a trillion plus is going to happen and Congress will go nowhere, they won't leave session until they get something done.
And also on the coronavirus situation, you still give 30% of people approving the way Trump is responding to coronavirus, the numbers of deaths, the numbers of hospitalizations, the view that it's been mishandled. Yes, at the federal as well as at the state and at the local level. But ultimately, the buck stops with the president. Whoever the president is, if those things go badly, it tends to hurt them. And then on top of that, you have all of the the protests, the social discontent, Black Lives Matter, the anti-government demonstrations happening in Portland and other places, and the response from federal authorities increasingly, all of that bodes badly for Trump. It's why he is under water, not just in national polls, which don't matter very much, but also in swing state polls, which really do.
So, if you look at those polls, like in 2016, you expect Trump is going to lose and lose pretty big. And I will say that almost all of my Democrat friends have been telling me they're more than willing to bet not only that Biden will win, but most of them are willing to bet that Biden is going to win by a landslide. I am not there. And I'm not there, not just because it's still early, because increasingly 99 days, you can't say it's that early, these polls, you know, do start to hold to a greater degree. So, if you're betting person, you would be betting in favor of Biden against Trump right now. But the big, big difference between 2016 and 2020 is that this coronavirus and the level of crisis, the extraordinary level of crisis domestically in the US, means that the ability to hold an election is itself more challenged. And President Trump, who continues to post regularly that it's rigged and that there's all sorts of problems with the primaries and problems with mail-in ballots and the rest, in 2016 he wasn't president, in 2020 he is, which means his ability to use, to leverage the power of the presidency, to change the way the election is conducted, and to also make lots of people feel that the election has been rigged and mishandled is vastly greater than it would have been in 2016.
We already see that with federal authorities and the Department of Homeland Security going in in Portland against the interests and desire of local elected political officials, very different than what we've seen with coronavirus. Coronavirus. You know, they mishandle it. Trump blames them for mishandling it, but says, not my responsibility. I'm not doing anything. You mishandle local demonstrations and there's a little bit of violence. Trump says, "I'm going in. This is horrible. And I'm going to send those authorities to other cities, too." Why? Because if there's greater violence and the protests become riots and they're seen as out of control, Trump believes that he has a better shot of getting those swing state voters that want law and order wants security, even if they don't like Trump all that much right now, and they're more willing to turn out. But also a greater chance for the president to be able to claim that the system, that the elections need to be held in a more secure fashion, giving the electoral authorities more control over those elections, more ability to say that it's rigged credibly, if the election goes against President Trump. All of those things are happening.
So, yeah, I expect we're going to see more violence because I think that plays into the desire of the incumbent to make people question how this election is actually going to be run. Now, you know, will anyone go along with him? I mean, I think it's virtually guaranteed that if Trump loses, he will say it's rigged. But will anyone go along with him? And I think it's important to recognize two things, the first is that his popularity among Republicans remains very high. There aren't as many people that identify as Republicans as used to. By the way, there aren't as many people identify as Democrats either. Both party affiliations have been going down, as people get more disgusted with the system, though, it's decreased a bit more on the right side of the spectrum, demographic changes in the US also matter in that regard, but the fact that you have a number of Republicans that I mean, you know, well over 85%, well over 90% in many polls, saying that they support Trump even now, no matter what, is very powerful. And it means that Republicans in Congress and Republicans in state legislatures are unwilling to go against the president. You think about the impeachment process, which passed easily in the House but was opposed easily in the Senate because only one Republican senator voted against him, Mitt Romney. Why was that? When you're talking about President Trump interfering politically in the election, trying to get the Ukrainian government to open an investigation against Trump's rival, Joe Biden, he wasn't the nominee the time but there was a decent chance he was going to be, and the answer is, because no matter what Trump does, as long as he's president, the Republicans are supporting him. So, the interesting question will be, if the election occurs and the Democrats say they won and the count shows that the Democrats won, that Biden won, but Trump says, "no, it's rigged," do the Republicans stick with him? And the answer, I think is, it depends on how close it is. I think if it's close, the Republicans are going to stick with him just as they did during impeachment. Even if it's pretty clear from an objective view that the Democrats probably won, I think they would be willing to say, no, it's rigged and make it partisan, make it polarized.
And so you've got a number of swing states where you have Republican legislatures and Democratic governors, and if it's close, you could easily imagine Trump says, "I won, I won those states." He's tweeting it, "I won." Irrespective of what the mainstream media is saying, right? And then you can imagine the legislature's reporting to Congress saying, "that's right, Trump won." While the governors report, "no, actually, Biden won." Now, that has to be decided by Congress. The judiciary, the Supreme Court has ruled on many other sorts of cases that internal voting of Congress is decided by Congress and the Supreme Court judiciary has no ability to weigh in on that. Well, this is the same thing. This would be a question of how Congress decides to handle it. And in the House. It's run by the Democrats. So, in that case, the Democrats would say Biden won. But in the Senate, the Republicans would say actually Trump won.
Well, then what happens? Historically in the United States, that's only happened once. It happened in 1876. There is no legal outcome. You have to create a political outcome. You need a deal. You would need both sides to come together and figure out an agreement on, someone becomes president, in return, there's a give to the other party. Back in 1876, the Republicans got the presidency but the Democrats got a lot of patronage, key slots, to allow them to hand out pork and also had the removal of US troops from the south. Basically ending the reconstruction. The funny thing is, I mean, depending on where federal troops are at that time across the United States, that may well be part of an agreement. I mean, we're not we're not faced in the aftermath of the civil war in the United States, but we are facing something that from a political, from an electoral perspective, only happened once in the history of the US. And I think people are underestimating just how unprecedented the next 99 days are going to be politically in our lifetimes in the United States.
Now, I think that is true if it's close. If it's not close, Trump will still say it's rigged but at that point, the difference is the Republicans no longer need to be with him because he's no longer going to be president. And whether or not Trump is not president still has a lot of influence is an interesting question that we should explore. Otherwise massive number of followers, unlikely Democrats would try to proceed. And actually, you know, indict him on anything in that environment. I think they want to move on and govern. And there are a lot of Trump-light types that are, you know, pretty significant lights in the Republican Party, senator Tom Cotton, you know, certainly Mike Pompeo, and the impact he'll have on the media and social media. So, I'm not someone also that believes that Trump has just gone from the political spectrum. I think Trumpism is going to be here for a while because the anti-establishment sentiment is very significant across the political spectrum in the United States right now. And I don't think that goes from Republican Party if Trump loses. But in any case, a big win by Biden, a sweeping win would mean that you wouldn't have the claims of a rigged election from Trump metastasizing across the Republican Party and therefore that election would get resolved pretty quickly