“There will be dire consequences for any country that tries to interfere with our free and fair elections,” National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said on Sunday in his first interview since recovering from the novel Coronavirus.
O’Brien told CBS ‘Face The Nation’ on Sunday that he has ‘completely’ recovered from COVID-19.
“I’m very, very grateful,” O’Brien said. “I was blessed and had a bright case.”
He added that COVID-19 “is a serious matter” and “a nasty virus”, which “has done great damage to our country.”
‘My heart goes out to the people who did not make it. I was happy, but there are a lot of people who did not make it, ‘he said. “There are a lot of people who are suffering as a result of this virus and this has been the case. My heart really goes out to them. ”
O’Brien returned to the White House last week after a contract of a “mild” case of coronavirus after two negative COVID-19 tests in a row and a week of being asymptomatic.
On Sunday, Host Margaret Brennan noted that “Congress and the White House have not been able to reach an agreement on more funding for things,” including “an incentive for funding for election safety that Democrats are asking for,” referring to the halted negotiations in the Senate on relief of phase 4 coronavirus.
She then pointed out that “this country never voted in a pandemic” and asked O’Brien, “Do you not need an impetus for electoral security for states in this country? Do you not need more money for November?”
“We are working on that with Congress,” he said in response.
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Asked if he expects a bill to pass before November, O’Brien said: ‘I hope so. ‘
“I want to make it clear that there has been no administration that has done more for electoral security than this administration,” he said.
O’Brien then wrote the measure taken by the National Security Council (NSC) to protect the upcoming elections.
“We have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in electoral security at the NSC. We have been conducting a policy coordination process on election security for months and months, we work with DHS [Department of Homeland Security]”We work with state secretaries across the country,” O’Brien said.
“There are no higher concerns than preserving the free and fair elections that are the cornerstone of our democracy.”
Recognizing that “the Chinese, the Iranians, the Russians” and others “want to interfere with our democracy,” he said, “We will fight against it. We will take every step necessary to strengthen our electoral infrastructure, our hardening cyber infrastructure and protecting our elections one hundred percent. “
Late last month, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence published a press release that said, “Today we see our opponents trying to compromise the private communications of American political campaigns, candidates and other political targets.”
“Our opponents are also trying to compromise our election infrastructure, and we will continue to monitor malicious cybercriminals seeking access to U.S. state and federal networks, including those responsible for conducting elections,” the release continued.
Brennan said the language in the release “sounds a lot like what Russia did in 2016, but now it’s happening on your watch, what are you doing to stop it?”
“What we do is we have our cyber teams in place,” O’Brien replied. “DHS is working very hard to track down those evil actors.”
He went on to say that “we know it’s China” and Russia are trying to “gain access to Secretary of State websites and collect such things and data about Americans and operate and influence operations, or it’s now on TikTok or Twitter and other spaces. ”
He acknowledged that “it was a real concern.”
O’Brien also noted that the Chinese do not want President Trump to be re-elected, because “he has become tougher on China than any president in history and we are standing up for the first time. [to] to protect the Chinese Communist Party and Americans, to protect our IP, to protect our economy, to protect our fax data. ”
O’Brien said “we are aware” that “China, like Russia, like Iran, is involved in cyber-attacks and phishing and that kind of thing about our electoral infrastructure, with respect to websites.”
“We are taking steps to counter it, whether it is China or Russia, Iran, we will not address it,” he said, adding that “there will be serious consequences” for “any country that tries to enter. seize our free and fair elections. ”
He said steps to tighten ‘electoral infrastructure’ in the US include ‘pumping money into the states’ and DHS ” mass program ‘, which runs’ to keep our elections free and fair.
“We will not decide in foreign countries who will be our next president. That is scandalous, “he added.
O’Brien also notes that “no administration has been more difficult on the Russians” and that the US has “sanctioned hundreds of Russian entities.”
“There can be almost nothing sanctioned by the Russians,” he said. “We are imposing so many sanctions on the Russians that, by the way the previous administration did not.”
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“We have sanctioned the witches of the Russians, individuals, companies, the government,” he said, adding that “we have literally outnumbered Russian spies” and “closed all their consulates on the West Coast” as well as theirs. “diplomatic facilities.”
