IS NORTH CAROLINA READY FOR
RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN 2022
MIDTERM ELECTIONS?
By Cash Michaels
Contributing Writer
In the 2016 elections, hackers with Russian military intelligence, according to the now infamous Robert Mueller Report to Congress, focused on North Carolina, among other states, to cause havoc and mayhem by fomenting racial and political divisions worse than they already were.
Russians used bogus social media to stir up distrust towards candidates and the political system in general. There were false allegations of voter fraud, and a Russian-backed “black” group that attempted to exploit a fatal police shooting in Charlotte to suppress the black youth vote for Hillary Clinton.
And it was discovered that a Russian citizen purchased the domain name for the Linda Coleman for Lt. Governor campaign website.
In addition, there was an Election Day breach of Durham County’s electronic voters poll books, which provides information on eligible voters.Those polling books were improperly rejecting eligible voters at their polling places, forcing election officials to use printed poll books, forcing massive delays.
State and local North Carolina elections officials learned valuable lessons from those episodes, the most valuable being…they can happen again.
Indeed, several Democratic senators say that Russian leader Vladmir Putin will probably try again to reek mass election confusion and strife in the U.S. , as payback for American involvement in the Russian-Ukraine war.
“Experts have warned that the increase in Russian disinformation and cyber threats creates a security concern for U.S. elections and that Russia will likely view the 2022 elections as a “ripe target” for influence operations,” U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar and Jack Reed recently wrote to U.S. intelligence agencies.
“With primaries underway for the 2022 midterm election cycle and ongoing preparations for the November general election, it is vital that the federal government does everything in its power to ensure our elections are free and fair.”
The November 2022 midterm elections are just a few short months away, and federal and state officials are already focused on fortifying all federal, state and local elections against Russian, as well as Chinese and Iranian cyber intrusion.
But they admit that there is only so much that they can do.
“We have a lot of security mechanisms in place,” Patrick Gannon, public information officer of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, said Monday.
“Some of what we already have in place will protect any attempts to hack into a [voting] system, however, the misinformation campaigns that come with that are probably what we’re more worried about at this point,” Gannon added. “That being their attempt to use social media and other outlets to misinform the public and ascorbate tensions between different political interests.”
As reported earlier this week by CNN, Homeland and other U.S. national security officials are concerned with Russian hacks of local elections being done “with the deliberate purpose of being noticed,” in order to fuel conspiracy theories that local elections are not secure.
By hacking a large number of local elections across the nation, including a politically dynamic state like North Carolina, the Russians would be able to foment further distrust and divisiveness. Already, the U.s. senate race between Democrat Cheri Beasley and Republican Ted Budd is seen as one of the premier neck-and-neck contests in the nation that could turn into a dirty free-for-all even without Russian influence.
We asked both the Beasley and Budd campaigns for their reactions to the prospect of Russian interference in their campaigns, but no response.
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20% TURNOUT FOR
MAY PRIMARIES
By Cash Michaels
Contributing writer
In the recent May 17th North Carolina primaries, 20% of the state’s voters turned out to cast a ballot for their favorite candidate to go on to the November 2022 midterm elections.
That’s 1.4 million out of over 7.3 million registered North Carolina voters - a near historic high, seconded only by a 21% turnout in 2002. And as of June 17th, all primary race results have now been certified, so the Democrat versus Republican contests for the November 2022 midterm elections are now set, except for where a runoff in July is required.
As reported before, the key to victory for either party during the midterms is not so much whether Democrats or Republicans across the state turnout, but rather how many unaffiliated voters turnout for either sides, thus bolstering their numbers.
At last count, there are more unaffiliated voters than either Democrats or Republicans in the state, meaning most elections are about winning as many of them over tap much as possible to either side.
Primaries are generally for the party faithful, so getting the lion’s share of left or right-leaning undecideds to turnout is key. In the May 17th primaries, a over 60% of unaffiliated voters across the state leaned Republican to choose candidates for the fall.
Now the question is, will those same unaffiliated come back for the November 8, 2022 midterms, and if so for who? That is what the expected torrent of political advertising over the next five months is going to be all about - swaying enough of them to join either voting Democrats or Republicans in November.
Per the NC General Assembly, Republicans in the state House and Senate are already in the majority in both houses, but how to elect a few more on each side to have veto-proof supermajorities.
Democrats, on the other hand, are hoping to gain more seats to keep the Republicans at bay so they can’t have the numbers to beat Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s vetoes as he completes his last two years in office.
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