The panel’s investigation found that Russia’s 2016 interference began as early as 2014 and continued into at least 2017, and it echoed findings from other federal officials who have said there is no evidence that any votes were changed or that any voting machines were compromised.

Notably, though, the heavily redacted report says U.S. officials believed that Russians probably “scanned” systems in every state — including activity such as basic research on “election-related web pages, voter ID information, election system software, and election service companies.” The Department of Homeland Security disclosed two years ago that Russian government hackers had targeted 21 states during the 2016 election cycle.

AD

AD

The Intelligence Committee found that, leading up the election, the federal government’s communication with the states about the nature and seriousness of the threat was unsatisfactory. It encouraged DHS to improve its coordination with state election officials — while stating firmly that states would remain in the lead on running elections.

“State election officials, who have primacy in running elections, were not sufficiently warned or prepared to handle an attack from a hostile nation-state actor,” the report says. It said the federal government “provided no clear reason for states to take this threat more seriously than any other alert received.”

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) wrote a minority opinion disagreeing with the report’s recommendation that states remain in charge of running elections.

AD

AD

“We shouldn’t ask a county election IT employee to fight a war against the full capabilities and vast resources of Russia’s cyber army,” Wyden wrote. “That approach failed in 2016 and it will fail again.”

While efforts have been made to improve communication and better secure election infrastructure, the report says the threat “remains imperfectly understood.”

The committee report comes one day after former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III appeared before the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees to highlight his report on Russian election interference and delivered similar warnings.

“They’re doing it as we sit here,” Mueller said. “And they expect to do it during the next campaign.”

The findings constitute the first chapter of the panel’s 2½ -year-long review of the intelligence community’s determination that Russia intervened in the 2016 president contest to aid Donald Trump’s chances, as well as its investigation into the role of social media in that campaign, and its assessment of how the Obama administration and the Trump campaign and transition teams responded to it.

AD

AD

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation is the only bipartisan congressional probe of Russia’s election interference, and its findings have the added gravitas of being backed by both parties, despite sharp disagreements between Democrats and Republicans across Congress about whether the Trump campaign is to blame for the effects of Russian election interference in 2016.

“In 2016, the U.S. was unprepared at all levels of government for a concerted attack from a determined foreign adversary on our election infrastructure,” the panel’s chairman, Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), said in a statement, noting that federal and state agencies had “dramatically changed” their approach to securing election systems since then. “The progress they’ve made over the last three years is a testament to what we can accomplish when we give people the opportunity to be part of a solution.”

Vice Chairman Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) said in a statement: “Our bipartisan investigation identified multiple problems and information gaps that hindered our ability to effectively respond and defend against the Russian attack in 2016. Since then — and in large part as a result of the bipartisan work done on this issue in our Committee — the intelligence community, DHS, the FBI, and the states have taken steps to ensure that our elections are far more secure today than they were in 2016.”

The report quotes Michael Daniel, a member of President Barack Obama’s National Security Council, saying that by August 2016, he had concluded that Russia had attempted intrusions in all 50 states.

AD

AD

“My professional judgment was we have to work under the assumption that they’ve tried to go everywhere, because they’re thorough, they’re competent, they’re good,” Daniel told the committee.

The report states that “intelligence developed later in 2018 bolstered Mr. Daniel’s assessment that all 50 states were targeted.”

The panel recommended that states make improvements to election infrastructure, such as ensuring that voting machines produce verifiable paper ballots. Congress approved $380 million in grants for states to improve their election security systems last year to help that effort.