Report on Russian Hacking of U.S. Elections

The National Intelligence Council’s declassified report, Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections, together with a background report on the Council’s “analytic process and Cyber Incident Attribution,” was released on January 6, 2017. The report’s “key judgments” are that “Russian efforts to influence the 2016 US presidential election represent the most recent expression of Moscow’s longstanding desire to undermine the US-led liberal democratic order, but these activities demonstrated a significant escalation in directness, level of activity, and scope of effort compared to previous operations.

We assess Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election. Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump. We have high confidence in these judgments.

The same day, President-elect Trump released a statement that

 I have tremendous respect for the work and service done by the men and women of this community to our great nation, [but] there was absolutely no effect on the outcome of the election, including the fact that there was no tampering whatsoever with voting machines. There were attempts to hack the Republican National Committee, but the RNC had strong hacking defenses and the hackers were unsuccessful.

Mr. Trump promised that, once he takes the oath of office, “America’s safety and security will be my number one priority.”
 

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