The Editorial Board

USA TODAY

The 1966 comedy "The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming" was a campy Cold-War spoof about a Soviet submarine run aground off New England and the resulting chaos. The title, a parody of Paul Revere's famous midnight-ride alert about invading British troops, was amusing.

Today, not so much. The Russians are undoubtedly coming. In fact, so far as mucking with American elections goes, they've already arrived.

"They're doing it as we sit here," former special counsel Robert Mueller warned lawmakers July 24. That was a day after FBI Director Christopher Wray told the Senate how "Russians are absolutely intent on trying to interfere with our elections."

Both men describe an assault by Moscow on America's presidential election process. In 2016, Russian operatives used social media to disseminate propaganda aimed at swaying voters toward Donald Trump. Russian hackers stole embarrassing Democratic campaign material and used WikiLeaks as a conduit to release it publicly.

Most stunningly, election infrastructures in all 50 states were likely penetrated, according to a heavily redacted Senate Intelligence Committee report released last week. The Russians could have altered voter registration data to create confusion as people arrived to vote. Preliminary displays of election results could have been manipulated. Thankfully, no proof that votes were changed was found, though the panel added a disturbing caveat that its "insight into this is limited."

MIKE HUCKABEE:'Election security' bill is just Democrats playing political games

The reality is that Russia launched a cyberattack in 2016, and the United States remains vulnerable. There are 8,000 jurisdictions in America's highly decentralized election system. The Russians — or another foreign adversary — only need to create disruption in a few key precincts of a few key states to throw a presidential contest into doubt. Trump won an Electoral College victory in 2016 by a mere 80,000 votes spread across three states.

How to make next year's elections more secure?

There are plenty of bipartisan alternatives, starting with financial assistance to harden election operations. Last year, Congress approved $380 million to do just that. It was a start, but a Brennan Center for Justice review shows too many election systems remain unprotected. House Democrats have proposed $600 million more, House Republicans $380 million. Split the difference and start making grants.

Republicans seem loath to dictate how local governments should run their voting operations. But when even one county's election system is attacked by a foreign adversary, the entire nation is at risk — just as the Japanese assault on Pearl Harbor in 1941 was more than an attack on Hawaii.

One bipartisan solution, the Secure Elections Act, would ensure a paper audit of election results to help guard against fraud. Other bipartisan legislation would criminalize any hacking of voting systems, with severe sanctions to follow.

Meanwhile, the Senate committee report urges that foreign adversaries be strenuously warned against attacks or suffer severe consequences. It's hard to know how or whether the Trump administration has responded.

Trump, who tends to regard any discussion of Russian interference as a blemish on his 2016 victory, was asked in Japan in June whether he would warn dictator Vladimir Putin not to interfere in the 2020 elections. Trump and Putin seem to treat the moment as a joke, as both grinned and the American president mockingly told Putin, "Don't meddle."

White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney later said the issue was seriously discussed. But FBI Director Wray testified last week that Russia has shown no signs of being dissuaded from potentially interfering in 2020.

That leaves the ball in Congress' court. Last week, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked two Democratic proposals he found too partisan. If McConnell dislikes the "Moscow Mitch" moniker as much as he says, he'll find a way to work across party lines to better protect America's democracy.

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