Hegseth Says Military Cyber Forces Will Guard U.S. Election Systems

The National Security Agency and other military intelligence and cybersecurity units will help protect U.S. election systems during the November midterm elections, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday.

Military cybersecurity specialists have regularly monitored election networks and worked to deter potential attacks since voting equipment was classified as “critical infrastructure” in 2017.

Hegseth’s announcement follows President Donald Trump’s dismantling of the civilian agency established to protect election infrastructure: the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, within the Department of Homeland Security. CISA released an election security plan last week outlining threats to voting systems and the assistance it would provide state and local election officials.

The announcements arrive only weeks before Election Day on Nov. 3, while early voting is already in progress. David Becker, a former Justice Department attorney who heads the nonprofit Center for Election Innovation & Research, said the compressed timeline “suggests this is just theater.”

“If the administration was serious about assisting state and local election officials, they shouldn’t have dismantled all of the federal government’s election cybersecurity capacity and fired all their experts in early 2025,” Becker said.

Although election-related support from the NSA and U.S. Cyber Command is standard practice, election security specialists, civil rights organizations and Democratic officials remain alert to any indication that the Trump administration could interfere with voting or ballot tabulation. Trump continues to promote false claims of widespread election fraud while seeking changes to long-established voting procedures.

ALSO READ: Nat Barr Takes Aim at Treasurer Jim Chalmers in Fiery On-Air Clash

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected Trump’s effort to limit mail-in voting. However, the justices have permitted the use of a federal database to verify voters’ citizenship.

In a Sept. 22 memo made public Monday, Hegseth instructed defense intelligence officials to deploy all available resources “to defend our election infrastructure from foreign malign influence and ensure that every lawful voter can cast their ballot free from foreign intimidation, coercion, or fear.”

___

Associated Press writer Nicholas Riccardi in Denver contributed to this report.