Democrats were crime victims. If Trump won't protect elections, we will: Donna Brazile Donald Trump refuses to lead on protecting U.S. elections, but somebody has to. That's why Democrats filed a lawsuit against him, Russia and WikiLeaks.

Donna Brazile | Opinion contributor

While President Trump and his allies like to dismiss the idea of Russian interference in our elections as a “hoax,” those of us who were at the Democratic National Committee know better. We were the victims of a very real crime.

Now the DNC has filed a civil lawsuit to address this outrage, and to bring attention to the crying need to protect the 2018 midterm elections.

I wholeheartedly endorse this action by DNC chair Tom Perez and the party to refocus attention on this frightening attack on our democracy. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has called it an “electronic Watergate,” and that's exactly right. While no adversaries broke down a door to the DNC headquarters, what they did was even more of an intrusion on our democracy.

They burrowed into our computer system and lurked there undetected for more than a year, siphoning off our private emails for later distribution via WikiLeaks, to undermine Hillary Clinton's campaign. They sought to destroy the party by sowing discord and division, discrediting our nominee with salacious lies and disinformation, and forcing us to spend untold millions to protect our data, remedy the hacking, and set up a firewall against additional hacking.

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The U.S. intelligence community agrees that the Russians interfered in our elections to favor Donald Trump. While the Russians hacked the DNC computers, the Trump campaign had multiple clandestine communications with Russian agents and with WikiLeaks. The Russians offered them stolen emails. And Roger Stone, Trump’s close adviser, sent clear signals that he had advance knowledge of the release of those stolen records.

It’s a conspiracy I described in my book Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House. Along with others of every political stripe, including members of the Trump administration, I have pressured the president to take his leadership role seriously and address these issues. His adamant refusal to do so has made this lawsuit necessary. As Perez said, “If the occupant of the Oval Office refuses to protect our democracy, it's up to us.”

The DNC’s lawsuit names the Russian government, WikiLeaks, and the Trump campaign as co-conspirators who “shared their goal of damaging the Democratic Party and helping elect Donald Trump.”

But this lawsuit is aimed at equity, not damages. The same was true of a similar lawsuit the DNC filed against Richard Nixon's campaign that was successfully settled in the era of Watergate. As before, all we want is accountability and a consent decree to take steps to protect our elections and preserve our democracy. The Russians tried to penetrate or hack into the election system in 21 states. The Department of Homeland Security is now working with state lawmakers to try and protect our voting infrastructure by establishing better safeguards, but with a budget of just $380 million. Will that be enough?

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The 2018 election is shaping up to be one with vigorous public involvement. The 2016 hacking and other intrusions have riled voters, who increasingly have come to realize that democracy is only as strong as citizen interest in preserving it. Democrats are energized like never before by their opposition to the policies and excesses of Trump and the GOP — but there is fear that if election security problems are not addressed, their voices once again will not be heard.

Workers wanting to organize and Fight for 15, parents of medically fragile children seeking to protect health care, students demanding protection from gun violence, climate activists fighting polluters — all need to know that their efforts will be fairly counted in November. They need to know that there will not be a repeat of 2016’s weaponized hacking that jeopardizes our sacred right to vote.

Since summer 2016 Democrats have called on Republicans to join with us to help protect our democracy. When I was party chair I reached out several times to Republican leadership to issue a joint statement in support of free and fair elections, but sadly I was ignored or outright refused. Now we must act. The DNC will be pursuing this legal remedy with a dedicated legal fund, not with the DNC donations for voter engagement and getting out the vote.

We need to demonstrate that we are committed to protecting our democracy. We need to take steps to ensure that our elections are protected from interference. And we need to make it clear that nobody is above the law by pursuing those who undermined our democracy in 2016. In filing the lawsuit, Perez said that "winning elections also means protecting elections, and today we’re doing just that." I'm glad that we are. Somebody has to.

Donna Brazile is the former interim chair of Democratic National Committee and author of Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House. Follow her on Twitter: @DonnaBrazile