The Senate Intelligence Committee blasted both Obama and Trump administration officials in a hearing exploring Russia's election interference in the 2016 and upcoming elections Wednesday. Their main point: there has not been sufficient urgency upon the part of either administration to combat it. Take this example of Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, who asked Trump Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen how many cabinet meetings had been held to discuss the issue. Her answer? "I take your point." That means the answer is none.
That's despite the fact, as she readily acknowledged the 2018 midterms and future elections are "clearly potential targets for Russian hacking attempts." Not good enough, was essentially the bipartisan consensus on the committee.
"When I listen to your testimony, I hear no sense of urgency to really get on top of this issue," said Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine. […]Senator Angus King, a Maine independent who caucuses with the Democrats, warned bluntly that the threat was "not being treated with the urgency that it deserves" and that a patchwork of defenses would mean little without a comprehensive cyberdeterrence strategy. Of the Russians' targeting of state systems in 2016, he said, "What it looks like is a test.""This country has to wake up," he said, later telling Ms. Nielsen, "I encourage you to go back with your hair on fire."
The recommendations released by the committee on Tuesday — the first such disclosure in its investigation—covered much of what experts and intelligence officials have been urging election authorities to do for months.
The panel also pressed the Trump administration to make it clear that any attack on an American election would be viewed as a hostile act.
Nielsen refused to reveal the 21 (or more) states targeted by Russian cyber attackers in 2016, saying the states "prefer to remain anonymous." California Sen. Dianne Feinstein pushed hard on that, saying "America has to know what's wrong. […] And if there are states that have been attacked, America should know that." Nielsen responded that the "21 states themselves have been notified," to which Feinstein responded, "But people have to know."
Feinstein didn’t hold her fire with Obama DHS official Jeh Johnson, either.