The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) have not identified any cyber attacks on the electronic infrastructure of the US elections this year.

This is stated in a joint statement of the departments.

"This year, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Agency (CISA) and the FBI have not recorded any cyber attacks on voter registration databases or systems related to voting," the intelligence agency said.

At the same time, it is indicated that the FBI and CISA are actively cooperating with the authorities at all levels on the issue of election security.

“We are closely coordinating with our electoral facilitation partners at the federal, state and local levels to protect the voting process.

We and our partners constantly monitor the risks associated with all voting methods during elections, and regularly provide this information to officials in individual states and localities in charge of our voting systems, ”- said in a statement.

It is also reported that the media will be especially active in covering cases that are regarded as "foreign interference" in the American elections.

At the same time, the departments called on the "preliminary unverified statements" to be considered "with a healthy dose of skepticism."

“More importantly, we recommend that voters turn to reliable sources of information, in this case, election officials in their states, who correctly pointed out that many voter registration data is freely available or can easily be acquired, ”the statement said.

Accusations for every taste

It is worth noting that the message from the FBI and CISA was made public amid ongoing accusations against Russia of "meddling" in the 2020 presidential election.

In August alone, several American politicians and officials, both Republicans and Democrats, announced this at once.

In particular, the representative of the Republican Party and the acting head of the US Department of Homeland Security (BIM) Chad Wolfe said in an interview with Axios that Washington is doing everything possible to hold Russia accountable for attempts to "interfere" in the American elections.

The head of the department also said that, "judging by the intelligence, without a doubt" Moscow "tried to intervene" in the 2016 election process and allegedly "continued to do so for the past four years."

  • Primaries in the U.S. state of Maryland

  • Reuters

  • © Jim Bourg

A Democrat, former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, speaking at a video seminar of the Atlantic Council *, also spoke about Russia's "interference" in the elections.

As the politician noted, the Russian side allegedly "is once again trying to support Donald Trump and help him to be re-elected."

In turn, the Assistant to the President of the United States for National Security Robert O'Brien threatened Russia with "serious consequences" for attempting to interfere in the 2020 US electoral process.

He announced this in an interview with SBS TV channel.

Director of the National Center for Counterintelligence and Security of the United States, William Evanina, also made an accusation against Russia.

According to him, Moscow is trying to "denigrate" the Democratic Party's presidential candidate Joe Biden.

In addition, Evanina argued that "some entities associated with the Kremlin" allegedly seek to improve Trump's position and use social networks and Russian TV channels for this.

In a joint statement, the Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi and the head of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, said that Russia is allegedly "actively taking a number of measures to undermine the presidential election and ensure an outcome that the Kremlin considers best in its interests."

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden said for his part that the office of the Director of National Intelligence of the United States did not conduct briefings for Congress on the security of the upcoming vote in order to hide the "re-election assistance" that Russian leader Vladimir Putin allegedly provides to Donald Trump.

Let us remind you that Russia has repeatedly categorically denied this kind of accusation.

As the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov noted at the end of July, Moscow "has never interfered in electoral processes in any country in the world," including in the United States.

Different interpretations 

According to political scientist and US expert Malek Dudakov, there is a bipartisan consensus in the United States that Russia is allegedly "interfering" in the 2020 American elections.

“The idea that Russian hackers associated with the Russian government are somehow 'interfering' in the US electoral process is so dominant in discourse, is so commonplace that any evidence to the contrary is usually simply not taken into account and skipped deafening in the United States, ”said the analyst.

At the same time, Konstantin Blokhin, a researcher at the Center for Security Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, clarifies that the positions of the parties on this issue are still somewhat different.

  • White House

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“The Republicans make statements about the possible interference of the Russian Federation in the elections, mostly preventively and mainly with the aim of demonstrating to the Americans that the Trump administration is ready to defend the United States and actively respond to the“ influence ”of Moscow, if it suddenly starts to be observed.

At the same time, if some politicians and officials representing the Republican Party, and declare the "interference" of the Russian Federation, they emphasize that it is local and does not radically affect the outcome of the elections, "the expert explained.

At the same time, the Democrats have a "more radical position" on this issue, Blokhin said.

“Representatives of the Democratic Party believe that the Russian Federation at the global level influences the electoral processes in the United States, which ultimately affects the final result,” the analyst said.

Blokhin believes that at this stage the Republicans benefit from the statement of the FBI and CISA, which denies any interference in the US elections in 2020.

“The Republican Party needs to be shown now that if Trump wins, then he became the President of the United States as a result of a clean election in the absence of various manipulations, including influence on the electoral process from other countries.

And the intelligence statement is an additional plus for Trump, ”the expert noted.

Blokhin said the report from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Agency for Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security speaks of a trend that has begun when intelligence chiefs begin to support the head of the White House.

“The fact that the heads of these departments are going over to Trump's side, albeit indirectly, may be due, among other things, to the cleansing that was once carried out by the American leader in the FBI.

And the Cybersecurity Agency was already created by order of the 45th US President, ”the analyst said.

However, Blokhin draws attention to the fact that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is still working "nomenklatura officers who share anti-Trump views."

The analyst believes that the statement by the FBI and the Agency for Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security "knocks the ground out from under the feet of the Democrats, since they are building their election campaign on the topic of Russian" interference "in the elections."

However, representatives of the Democratic Party "will continue to pour out their groundless accusations against Russia, since they have no other options how to rally their electorate."

  • Federal Bureau of Investigation Headquarters

  • Reuters

  • © Yuri Gripas

“They will shout that the FBI is bought, their rhetoric will remain the same.

A similar situation will develop if the Democrats lose the elections.

Representatives of this political force will begin to declare with even greater bitterness that the Russians are "interfering" in all spheres of American life.

They will also say that those who support Trump are Russian agents, ”the expert noted.

At the same time, Malek Dudakov predicts that "politically biased reports on the influence of Russian hackers on the elections will appear after the elections."

“If Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden wins, then less attention will be paid to this, but if Donald Trump can be re-elected for a second term, then the anti-Russian wave will rise again, they will say that Russia helped Trump win,” the analyst concluded.

* "Atlantic Council" (Atlantic Council of the United States) - an organization whose activities are recognized as undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation by the decision of the Prosecutor General's Office of 25.07.2019.