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President Donald Trump used a half-hour prime-time address from the White House to assert that he had declassified hundreds of intelligence files showing Chinese efforts to sway the 2020 presidential election in Joe Biden’s favor. The president accused Beijing of the illicit acquisition of 220 million voter files that included personal information, adding that voter data in 18 states had been bought, stolen or hacked by China. Trump did not present evidence that China had used any such information to alter voting systems or influence outcomes, according to multiple outlets that carried the speech including The Washington Post and Reuters. Officials from his administration appeared behind him during the remarks, but reporters were not permitted to ask questions.
A 2021 assessment by the National Intelligence Council concluded with high confidence that China did not deploy interference efforts and considered but did not deploy influence efforts intended to change the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. The report, declassified and released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, stated that Beijing did not view either election outcome as advantageous enough to risk blowback if caught. An August 2020 National Intelligence Council assessment had similarly concluded that China preferred Trump’s defeat but did not intend to try to affect the election while separately noting Russian actors amplifying claims of fraud. Trump nonetheless maintained that documents he released showed efforts by Chinese intelligence to undermine his reelection.
The president further alleged that U.S. voting machines are extremely exposed to interference by foreign adversaries including Russia, China and Iran, a claim that built on long-documented shortcomings in election infrastructure. According to a Brennan Center for Justice analysis of election administration, voting machines undergo rigorous testing and are never connected to the internet, countering repeated assertions that they serve as vectors for tampering. Trump also stated that the Department of Homeland Security had identified 278,000 non-citizens registered to vote though he offered no details on whether any had cast ballots or affected results, a figure that aligns with preliminary DHS reviews reported by Fox News identifying more than 256,000 potential matches across four states. In addition, he referenced a Michigan law enforcement investigation into an alleged voter registration fraud scheme by a Democratic-affiliated group that he said was constrained by the FBI before the statute of limitations expired.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington told Reuters that Beijing has never and will never interfere in U.S. presidential elections. Top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer posted on social media that voters choose their leaders in America and that Democrats would fight to ensure every American could cast a ballot freely without interference from Trump. Former Vice President Kamala Harris wrote on X that the president wanted voters to lose confidence in the electoral system so they would stay home in November. Democrats overall accused the president of attempting to sow doubts about the security of the upcoming midterms that will determine control of Congress.
Shortcomings in U.S. election infrastructure were well-documented after the 2016 election, which the U.S. intelligence community assessed included Russian hacking, social media influence operations and on-the-ground activities. A subsequent report from the Brennan Center for Justice noted that many of those vulnerabilities had been addressed in the years since through improved cybersecurity and state-level protections. The Heritage Foundation’s voter fraud database has recorded 99 instances of noncitizen voting nationwide since 2000, while a Brennan Center study of 42 jurisdictions covering the 2016 election identified just 30 suspected cases representing 0.0001 percent of total votes cast in those areas. Louisiana’s review of four decades of elections turned up only 79 potential noncitizen votes out of an estimated 74 million ballots according to the state’s Republican secretary of state.
Trump closed the address by renewing his call for passage of the SAVE America Act, which would ban most mail voting, require proof of citizenship for registration and mandate photo identification at the polls. The legislation passed the House of Representatives but has stalled in the Senate after multiple procedural votes failed to advance it, according to congressional records on Congress.gov and reports from The Hill detailing 48-50 rejections on key amendments. Election administrators in several states have told PBS NewsHour that such measures could create unnecessary barriers while existing safeguards already limit noncitizen participation to rare instances. The speech came after a Washington Post-Ipsos poll showed Trump’s approval rating at 37 percent amid concerns over the cost of living and foreign policy matters.
