Incredibly, the president’s memo seeking to ostracize Krebs stands reality on its head, accusing Krebs of promoting the censorship of election information, “including known risks associated with certain voting practices.” Trump also alleged that Krebs “falsely and baselessly denied that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen, including by inappropriately and categorically dismissing widespread election malfeasance and serious vulnerabilities with voting machines” [emphasis added]. Timothy Haugh Heritage Foundation Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate Martin Matishak National Counterintelligence and Security Center national security agency Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar Newsweek Paul Rosenzweig Pennsylvania Capital-Star Raphael Satter Reuters Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act (SAVE) Act Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt Sen. President Trump last week revoked security clearances for Chris Krebs, the former director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) who was fired by Trump after declaring the 2020 election the most secure in U.S. history. “Regular meetings between the National Security Council and European national security officials have gone unscheduled, and the NSC has also stopped formally coordinating efforts across U.S. agencies, including with the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department,” Reuters reported, citing current and former officials. “It is astonishing, too, that President Trump would fire the nonpartisan, experienced leader of the National Security Agency while still failing to hold any member of his team accountable for leaking classified information on a commercial messaging app – even as he apparently takes staffing direction on national security from a discredited conspiracy theorist in the Oval Office,” Warner said in a statement. Pennsylvania’s Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt recently warned the CISA election security cuts would make elections less secure, and said no state on its own can replace federal election cybersecurity resources. “Reuters contacted 33 of the largest U.S. cybersecurity companies, including tech companies and professional services firms with large cybersecurity practices, and three industry groups, for comment on Trump’s action against SentinelOne,” wrote Raphael Satter and A.J. Vicens. Many state leaders have voiced anxiety over the administration’s cuts to CISA programs that provide assistance and threat intelligence to election security efforts. “The agency’s National Risk Management Center, which serves as a hub analyzing risks to cyber and critical infrastructure, is expected to see significant cuts, said two sources familiar with the plans,” The Record’s Suzanne Smalley wrote. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) urged professionals in the cybersecurity community to defend Krebs and SentinelOne, noting that other security companies and professionals could be the next victims of Trump’s efforts to politicize cybersecurity. A bipartisan association representing 46 secretaries of state, and several individual top state election officials, have pressed the White House about how critical functions of protecting election security will perform going forward. “CISA was able to quickly identify not only that it was fraudulent, but also the source of it, so that we could share with our counties and we could share with the public so confidence in the election wasn’t undermined,” Schmidt said. When the Justice Department began prosecuting people who violently attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, President Trump and Republican leaders shifted the narrative, claiming that Trump lost the election because the previous administration had censored conservative voices on social media. As Reuters notes, the FBI last month ended an effort to counter interference in U.S. elections by foreign adversaries including Russia, and put on leave staff working on the issue at the Department of Homeland Security. The White House memo, which also suspended clearances for other security professionals at Krebs’s employer SentinelOne, comes as CISA is facing huge funding and staffing cuts. Nevada and 18 other states are suing Trump over an executive order he issued on March 25 that asserts the executive branch has broad authority over state election procedures. “Foreign intelligence entities, particularly those in China, are targeting current and former U.S. government (USG) employees for recruitment by posing as consulting firms, corporate headhunters, think tanks, and other entities on social and professional networking sites,” the alert warns. “None of the president’s powers allow him to change the rules of elections,” Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar wrote in an April 11 op-ed. Responsibility for determining the root causes of the Salt Typhoon security debacle fell to the Cyber Safety Review Board (CSRB), a nonpartisan government entity established in February 2022 with a mandate to investigate the security failures behind major cybersecurity events. Meanwhile, the U.S. Senate is now considering a House-passed bill dubbed the “Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act,” which would order states to obtain proof of citizenship, such as a passport or a birth certificate, in person from those seeking to register to vote. In February, CISA cut roughly 130 employees, including its election security advisors. “The Chinese official’s remarks at the December meeting were indirect and somewhat ambiguous, but most of the American delegation in the room interpreted it as a tacit admission and a warning to the U.S. about Taiwan,” The Journal’s Dustin Volz wrote, citing a former U.S. official familiar with the meeting. On April 9, the National Counterintelligence and Security Center warned (PDF) that Chinese intelligence entities are pursuing an online effort to recruit recently laid-off U.S. employees. Even the conservative Heritage Foundation acknowledges as much: An interactive “election fraud map” published by Heritage lists just 1,576 convictions or findings of voter fraud between 1982 and the present day. “The White House must not be given free reign to turn cybersecurity professionals into political scapegoats,” the EFF wrote.
This Cyber News was published on krebsonsecurity.com. Publication date: Tue, 15 Apr 2025 03:40:05 +0000