US States Object to Obama’s ‘Critical Infrastructure’ Election Systems

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The decision by the Obama administration to label voting and ballot counting operations as critical infrastructure threatens to undermine hacking protections inherent in decentralized election systems that are managed by individual US states, the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS) warned in a press release on Monday.

"State and local autonomy over elections is our greatest asset against malicious cyberattacks and manipulation," the release stated. "Our decentralized, low [internet] connectivity electoral process is inherently designed to withstand such threats."

Late on Friday, US Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson decreed the state-run election systems as "critical infrastructure."

Monday’s release called the designation "legally and historically unprecedented, raising many questions and concerns for states and localities with authority over the administration of our voting process."

Johnson’s decision was apparently prompted by earlier warnings from the Obama administration that Russian hackers could attempt to alter vote tallies to favor President-elect Donald Trump during the November 8 election.

Since the election, the US Democratic Party has attempted to blame the unexpected loss by its presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Russian hackers.

An intelligence report on Friday blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for orchestrating a cyber campaign to support President-elect Donald Trump — a charge that the Kremlin has consistently denied.

Monday’s release noted that no credible evidence of hacking, including attempted hacking of voting machines or vote counting by any third party, was ever presented or discovered in any US state.

Moreover, state and local autonomy over elections is the greatest asset against malicious cyberattacks and manipulation because voting systems are not connected to the internet, the release explained.

Throughout the history of the United States, individual states have been responsible for voting and ballot tallies in national elections.

The release’s description of Johnson’s action as unprecedented implied fears that some officials in Washington want to take control of elections away from individual states.

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