Speeches at the Cybersecurity Summit: Who Is Admitting that the Russians Interfered in U.S. Elections?

Rotunda, Alexander Hamilton US Customs House

It is useful for politicians to contradict themselves. It is crooked, yes, but it is a handy way to persuade people.

Speaking at the Alexander Hamilton United States Custom House, a building of great beauty, Vice President Michael Pence opposed Russian cyberattacks during the Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity Summit yesterday. Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen made similar comments in her talk. 

Elsewhere, however, President Donald Trump himself continued his angry protest against the claim that Russia meddled on his behalf in United States elections, while both supporters and opponents claim that he has been weak on election security. 

However, Mr. Pence and Ms. Nielsen argued that the administration is protecting election security. Is this (1) Politics as usual? (2) Or a clever, albeit dubious, persuasive method that sidesteps an important issue by taking contradictory positions? I lean toward (2). Here’s why:

Mike Pence

Mr. Pence emphasized the Trump administration’s commitment to cybersecurity, especially with respect to the United States’ elections. There have, of course, been well-documented reports that the Russian government intervened in the 2016 election to favor Donald Trump, using such methods as divisive Facebook posts, fake news articles, and attempted voting machine hacking. Following the tradition that politicians take both sides of every issue, Mr. Pence specifically acknowledged the Russian government’s efforts, promising that the full force of the United States government will be brought to bear to secure the integrity of the United States elections.

Not only did Mr. Pence discuss election security, but he also reviewed ways in which foreign governments, especially Russia, had attacked financial institutions, state government operations, computer access, and intellectual property. Mr. Pence clearly acknowledged what should have been obvious for some time, that the Russian government did meddle in American elections:

“While other nations certainly possess the capability, the fact is Russia meddled in our 2016 elections.  That is the unambiguous judgment of our intelligence community, and, as the President said, we accept the intelligence community’s conclusion.”

He assured his audience that President Trump had ordered massive efforts to improve cyber security and election security. Noting that elections are conducted by state and local governments, not the federal government, Pence expressed concern that states were not ready to protect voting integrity:

“Yet it concerns us that many states still don’t have concrete plans to upgrade their voting systems, and 14 states are struggling to replace outdated voting machines that lack paper trails before the next presidential election.”

Before we get too excited, look at the end of this post to see what Congress is (not) doing about state election security. 

Kirstjen Nielsen

At the same meeting, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen M. Nielsen commented forcefully that: “Our democracy itself is in the crosshairs.”  She agreed with the intelligence community that “It was the Russians. We know that, they know that.” She continued that “It is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”

Well and good. But, (1) are all members of the administration and the Republican majority in Congress reading form the same page? And, (2) if they are obviously not on the same page, then why not? Are they just confused, as the news media often imply? Or are they, as both claimed, saying what President Trump wanted them to say about cybersecurity? I am inclined to think that this looks like a purposeful persuasive strategy.

Let us recall that President Trump has been very inconsistent about cybersecurity, and that he hedged when he discussed Russian election interference at the recent Helsinki Summit. He has been tweeting that the Department of Justice’s investigation into Russian meddling is a “witch hunt” directed at him personally. 

Just today, the Republican-majority House of Representatives strongly opposed additional funding to improve states’ voting security, implausibly claiming that the money was not needed. One cannot help but to wonder why they would oppose such an obvious step.

To see why administration officials say such different things, consider that Mr. Trump has at least two different audiences who want to hear different things:

Audience A wants to hear that the President is on top of cybersecurity and is protecting the nation. Thus, the speeches by Mr. Pence and Ms. Nielsen specifically attributed aggressive security arrangements to administration policy and President Trump himself.

Audience B, the audience that accepts Mr. Trump’s conspiracy theories, went to hear exactly what Mr. Trump himself was saying: that it was all a witch hunt and that his enemies had invented the entire problem.

So, Mr. Trump can continue to express his conspiracy theories and protest the investigation. At the same time, his subordinates can assure everybody that Mr. Trump is defending the nation against Russian cyberattacks. In this way, the Trump administration can take both sides of the same issue. It’s actually very clever – confusing, and not entirely honest – but very clever.