Trump Accused China of Interfering in American Elections

US President Donald Trump delivered a 25-minute address to the nation in which he accused China of interfering in American elections and announced the declassification of intelligence materials that he said substantiated the allegations.

“Our country has suffered tremendous harm—our elections were left vulnerable to fraud and theft, and the trust of the American people was lost. This cannot be allowed to continue. Every American, whether you are a Republican, a Democrat, an independent or anything else, must agree that we deserve the most secure, honest and fair election system in the world. Secure elections…should not be a partisan issue,” Trump said.

According to Trump, the declassified documents reveal “shocking vulnerabilities in America’s election infrastructure”: China illegally obtained access to the data of 220 million American voters—including names, addresses and other information used for voter registration—while the personal data of “tens of millions” of voters across 18 states was purchased, stolen or hacked.

The report cited by the president says that China had been collecting information on American voters, public opinion, political parties, candidates and senior officials since at least 2008—probably to forecast election results.

“This information includes names, addresses, phone numbers, party preferences and other sensitive data needed to register voters and carry out other nefarious activities. This data breach represents an unprecedented election-security nightmare. The intelligence also shows that China created a dedicated data-processing unit specifically to carry out this project,” Trump said.

The president claims that Beijing sought to influence the 2018 midterm elections and the 2020 presidential election because “the Chinese government wanted me to lose the 2020 election because I imposed tariffs on them” (Trump, it bears recalling, lost that election). He also said China “paid large sums to American journalists” to publish negative stories about him.

Trump also accused the US intelligence community of deliberately concealing information about the scale of China’s activities. He said he had instructed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Justice Department, the FBI and the CIA to investigate “how and why such important information was hidden” by US authorities, dismiss those involved in the concealment and, where warranted, bring criminal charges against them.

The president further claimed that voter rolls include about 278,000 non-US citizens as well as deceased people, and once again questioned the reliability of electronic voting systems. He urged Republicans to advance the SAVE America Act, which would require voters to present photo identification, provide proof of US citizenship when registering and substantially restrict voting by mail.

Trump added that “television networks that do not broadcast this address should lose their licenses.”

At the beginning of his speech, the president made only a brief reference to the conflict with Iran, saying the United States was “winning major victories,” and listed his domestic achievements, including tax cuts and tougher immigration policies, before turning to election security.

Before the address began, Chinese Embassy spokesperson Liu Chang told Reuters in response to an inquiry: “China has never interfered and will never interfere in US presidential elections.”