By Ken Dilanian - NBC News
WASHINGTON - Despite repeated claims by senior Trump Administration officials that China sought to harm then-President Donald Trump in the 2020 election, a recently declassified intelligence community investigation found that
China did not seek to influence the results of that choice.
That is perhaps the most interesting revelation of a summary on electoral interference that ensures what the Government had already been telling the public: that there were no Russian agents who hacked the electoral infrastructure, but they do say that
Russian President Vladimir Putin authorized " Influence operations designed to denigrate the candidacy of President Joe Biden
and the Democratic Party, support former President Trump, undermine public confidence in the electoral process, and exacerbate socio-political divisions in the United States. "
China, on the other hand, "considered but did not deploy influential efforts
aimed at changing the outcome of the US presidential elections," the assessment says, noting that intelligence agencies have "great confidence in this judgment."
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"China sought stability in its relationship with the United States, but did not consider any of the election results to be beneficial enough for China to risk being caught meddling," the investigation says.
This
contradicts statements last year by Trump Administration officials,
Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, former Attorney General William Barr and National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien, that China was interfering in the elections to harm the US. Trump.
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A member of the intelligence community, the national cyber intelligence officer, disagreed with that conclusion, arguing that China did carry out some online tactics to attack Trump.
But the overall assessment does not support that conclusion.
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The investigation found no indications that any foreign actor had attempted to hack or compromise any technical aspect of the voting process in the 2020 elections, that is, with regard
to software, voting machines, vote tabulation or registration data. voters.
The assessment further says that
Iran worked to harm Trump.
"We find that Iran carried out a covert multi-front campaign of influence aimed at undermining former President Trump's reelection prospects (albeit without directly promoting his rivals), undermining public confidence in the electoral process
and in American institutions, sowing division and exacerbate social tensions
in America, "says the research.