China and Iran don't want Trump to win re-election, Russia works against Biden, says top election official in intelligence community

US intelligence: says Russia seeks to help Trump reelection 5:36

(CNN) - The top election security official for the US intelligence community said in a statement Friday that China "prefers" an outcome in which President Donald Trump is not re-elected in November and that Russia is working to undermine the candidacy of former Vice President Joe Biden to the White House.

"We assess that China prefers that President Trump, whom Beijing considers unpredictable, not win re-election," said William R. Evanina, director of the National Center for Counterintelligence and Security, in a statement updating the landscape of electoral threats in the face of the November elections.

"China has been expanding its influencing efforts prior to November 2020 to shape the political environment in the United States, pressure political figures it sees as opposed to China's interests, and deflect and counter criticism of China."

“We assess that Russia is using a series of measures to denigrate mainly former Vice President Biden and what he sees as an anti-Russia 'establishment'. This is consistent with Moscow's public criticism of him when he was vice president for his role in the Obama administration's policies on Ukraine and his support for the anti-Putin opposition within Russia, "Evanina added.

Evanina also claimed that Iran is seeking "to undermine the democratic institutions of the United States, to President Trump, and to divide the country."

Evanina's statement is the clearest the intelligence community has been in suggesting that Russia prefers one candidate over the other in the 2020 race.

The intelligence community assessed in 2017 that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an "influence campaign" designed to harm Hillary Clinton and designed to help Trump win.
CNN reported Friday that US intelligence officials presented information to lawmakers and presidential campaigns indicating that Russia is behind an ongoing disinformation campaign targeting Biden.

Biden's campaign advisers have already discussed Evanina's assessment, according to a person familiar with the discussions. The team has focused specifically on the semantics of the statement as it relates to the former vice president, noting that Russia is unambiguously seeking to "denigrate" Biden, while China simply "prefers" a Trump defeat.

Evanina was criticized by Democratic leaders last month when she last issued a warning about efforts by Russia, China and Iran to interfere in the November elections.

Legislators claimed that his statement did not do "enough" to provide the American public with information about foreign attempts to influence the elections.

In a joint statement, Senators Marco Rubio, Acting Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, thanked Evanina Friday for providing additional information on the threats and encouraged the intelligence community to "continue to make this information available."

The two senators also called on "political leaders on all sides to refrain from using intelligence matters as weapons for political gain, as this only furthers the divisive goals of our adversaries."

CNN's Manu Raju and Veronica Stracqualursi contributed to this report.

Elections 2020 United StatesJoe Biden