Sen. Claire McCaskill, one of the most endangered Senate incumbents in this fall’s midterm elections, said "it is outrageous" that Russian hackers "think they can get away with this." | Bill Boyce/AP Photo 'I will not be intimidated': McCaskill responds to report of Russian targeting

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) responded on Thursday to a report that Russian hackers attempted to target her Senate computer network, declaring that the Kremlin’s cyberattacks were “not successful” and that she “will not be intimidated” by President Vladimir Putin.

“Russia continues to engage in cyber warfare against our democracy,” McCaskill said in a statement. “I will continue to speak out and press to hold them accountable. While this attack was not successful, it is outrageous that they think they can get away with this. I will not be intimidated. I’ve said it before and I will say it again, Putin is a thug and a bully.”


The remarks from the Missouri Democrat — one of the most endangered Senate incumbents in this fall’s midterm elections — followed a story by The Daily Beast reporting that the Russian intelligence agency responsible for interfering in the 2016 presidential race also sought to undermine McCaskill’s bid for a third term.

The statement also marks the first time a lawmaker has confirmed they've been the target of an attack blamed on Russians related to the 2018 midterms, a critical vote that could shape the remainder of the President Donald Trump's presidency.

The president and McCaskill have clashed repeatedly during his term in the White House, and she's been a fierce critic of Russia. The president lashed out at her in a tweet last month calling her a "phony."

In light of special counsel Robert Mueller's recent indictments of 12 Russian officials on charges of hacking U.S. democratic institutions and targeting state and local election organizations, Washington has become increasingly worried that Moscow may attempt to meddle in the upcoming elections, too.

While Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and Homeland Security officials have indicated that Russians continue to interfere in American politics with social media disinformation campaigns, it wasn't until last week that evidence surfaced of cyber attacks aimed at political candidates.

At the Aspen Security Forum, Tom Burt, Microsoft’s vice president for security and trust, said the company detected and helped block hacking attempts against three congressional candidates this year. He did not identify the specific campaigns or specify whether the hacking attempts originated from Russia.

“Earlier this year, we did discover that a fake Microsoft domain had been established as the landing page for phishing attacks,” said Burt. “And we saw metadata that suggested those phishing attacks were being directed at three candidates who are all standing for election in the midterm elections.”

Morning Score newsletter Your guide to the permanent campaign — weekday mornings, in your inbox. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

He said the targets were “people who, because of their positions, might have been interesting targets from an espionage standpoint as well as an election disruption standpoint.”

According to The Daily Beast, which conducted its own forensic analysis of the attack on McCaskill's office, the attempt "was a variant of the password-stealing technique used by Russia’s so-called 'Fancy Bear' hackers against [Hillary] Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta, in 2016."

If successful, that sort of phishing attack could have given hackers access to potentially sensitive information about McCaskill's office and campaign. In the 2016 attacks on the Democratic National Committee, attackers were able to obtain damaging information that they leaked online and gave to media outlets in an effort to discredit the DNC and Hillary Clinton's campaign.

Since Trump's meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Trump has gone back and forth about whether Moscow is continuing to meddle in American politics.

But in his most recent tweet on about election meddling, Trump said, "I’m very concerned that Russia will be fighting very hard to have an impact on the upcoming Election. Based on the fact that no President has been tougher on Russia than me, they will be pushing very hard for the Democrats. They definitely don’t want Trump!"

Eric Geller contributed reporting to this report.