U.S. Names Official to Counter Foreign Election Interference

[brooklynite]

Source: New York Times

WASHINGTON — The director of national intelligence, Avril D. Haines, has appointed a new officer to oversee threats to elections, filling a critical role in the nation’s efforts to counter foreign election interference, her office said on Friday.

The new officer, Jeffrey Wichman, who has worked at the C.I.A. for more than three decades, will take over as the election threats executive at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence next week, said Nicole de Haay, a spokeswoman for the director of national intelligence.

Individual intelligence agencies like the National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command have already begun stepping up election threat monitoring ahead of this year’s midterm elections. But without a new election threats executive, some on Capitol Hill had feared progress had stalled, coordination had diminished and important analytical differences had been left unresolved.

Mr. Wichman’s appointment came after the Office of the Director of National Intelligence was forced to delay plans to create a foreign malign influence center that would oversee efforts from abroad to influence elections and American politics more generally. Creation of that center has been slowed by disagreements on Capitol Hill over the size of the effort and its funding.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/14/us/politics/foreign-election-interference.html

[Slammer]

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