The Office of the Director of National Intelligence announced Friday that its top counterintelligence official would carry out all election security intelligence briefings to 2020 candidates and campaigns instead of the FBI or Department of Homeland Security.
The nation’s top spy office, which oversees all 17 spy agencies and is currently led by acting spy chief Richard Grenell, said that the intelligence community “will lead all intelligence-based threat briefings to candidates, campaigns, and political organizations under the U.S. government’s notification framework.” ODNI said William Evanina, the director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center since 2014, will “serve as the IC’s leader to this critical effort.” The ODNI also announced reforms to the National Counterterrorism Center on Friday.
“U.S. elections are the foundation of our nation’s democracy,” Evanina said in a statement. “We are committed to supporting this Administration’s whole-of-government effort to secure the 2020 election.”
Evanina, a former FBI special agent, has led the NCSC since 2014, and, in February 2018, was nominated by President Trump to be the first Senate-confirmed director of the center. He was confirmed by the Senate last week when a two-year standoff ended after Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley said Grenell and Attorney General William Barr had provided long-sought transparency for the Trump-Russia congressional investigations.
The intelligence community press release stated that having Evanina provide all the campaign briefings on intelligence threats “represents an important improvement and simplification to the threat notification process,” and “the IC will continue to work in partnership with FBI and DHS to identify and integrate threat information.” ODNI said Evanina and the elections team “will act swiftly to deliver the timely and thorough assessments to those affected by potential malicious influence.”
An intelligence official told the Washington Examiner that intelligence community leaders believed it made sense for the intelligence community to lead intelligence briefings while noting that election security broadly is about more than just threat briefings. The ODNI official said election security efforts such as the FBI’s Protected Voices initiative and DHS’s cybersecurity and infrastructure protection plans would continue full steam, and the biggest change is that Evanina would lead the 2020 briefings for campaigns to help them guard against foreign interference.
National security officials, including Evanina, told lawmakers in March that the intelligence community has not concluded Russia is backing any particular 2020 candidate and warned about interference from multiple countries.
The information appeared in an unclassified ODNI fact sheet, which rejected a stream of media reports on classified briefings on election security.
“The IC has not concluded that the Kremlin is directly aiding any candidate’s reelection or any other candidates’ election. Nor have we concluded that the Russians will definitely choose to try to do so in 2020,” the fact sheet read. “This is not a Russia-only problem. China, Iran, other countries like North Korea and Cuba, and non-state actors all have the opportunity, means, and potential motive to interfere in the 2020 elections as a way to achieve their goals.”
This statement countered anonymously sourced media reports, which said the intelligence community concluded Russia was helping Trump with reelection and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont win the Democratic primaries.
Rep. John Ratcliffe of Texas, who was renominated by Trump earlier this year to be the permanent director of national intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee earlier this month that, if confirmed, he would keep the Senate informed if the intelligence community concludes the Russians are promoting a specific candidate in 2020. The spy chief nominee also said he had no intention of making changes to the leadership running ODNI’s election security efforts, including promising to keep on Election Threats Executive Shelby Pierson.
Ratcliffe also weighed in on Russian election interference during his testimony.
“My views are Russia meddled or interfered with active measures in 2016, they interfered in 2018, and they will attempt to do so in 2020. They have a goal of sowing discord, and they have been successful in sowing discord, fortunately, based on the good work of this committee, we know they may have been successful in that regard, but they have not been successful in changing any votes or in changing the outcome of any election,” Ratcliffe testified. “I’m for safe, secure, credible elections, and I will do everything that I can as DNI to ensure they are not successful.”
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s two-year investigation concluded “the Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion” but “did not establish” any criminal conspiracy between Trump and Russia.
Grenell, who is serving concurrently as the U.S. ambassador to Germany, also announced several organizational changes to the National Counterterrorism Center on Friday, which were “based on the recommendations of career Intelligence Community officers.” In March, Grenell picked Lora Shiao, a longtime counterterrorism intelligence veteran, to be the National Counterterrorism Center’s acting deputy director, and Clare Linkins, who has spent years in the counterterrorism arena, was picked as the NCTC’s next executive director at the same time.
“We are facing a time in our nation’s history where the threat picture is far broader than terrorism, and the IC needs to shift resources to address a wide range of complex, sophisticated adversaries,” Shiao said. “In consultation with our entire NCTC senior leadership team, Executive Director Clare Linkins and I will be shifting some elements within NCTC to address previous studies and recommendations, and we will work in collaboration with our IC partners to best position NCTC and the wider CT community for the future.”
The biggest changes were made within the NCTC’s Directorate of Strategic Operational Planning and its Directorate of Terrorist Identities.
Democratic House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, who has clashed with Grenell repeatedly, released a statement claiming that “our Committee did not authorize these latest changes — announced, once again, late on a Friday — by a temporary and unqualified Acting Director of National Intelligence.”
“Only in Washington, D.C. would one be appointed to a job but not expected to DO the job,” Grenell quipped Friday evening.
