I saw this a couple of days back. it's hard to keep up with the machinations.


Jan 9, 5:46 PM EST
US move to secure election systems meets criticism
By TAMI ABDOLLAH
Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A last-minute decision by the Obama administration to designate election systems as critical infrastructure drew intense criticism from state and federal elections organizations on Monday.

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson announced the move Friday with 30 minutes' notice to the National Association of Secretaries of State and U.S. Election Assistance Commission, an independent bipartisan federal agency that develops voluntary voting guidelines and certifies voting systems.

Officials at both agencies are criticizing the department for what they said was a failure to work with state officials to fully answer their questions about the designation before making the change.

"We're having trouble understanding exactly what they're going to do, that we're not already doing," Connecticut Secretary of State Denise W. Merrill, who heads the national secretaries association, told The Associated Press. "States were already doing much of this (security work) themselves using very different products."

Discussions between Homeland Security Department officials and the states about whether to designate elections systems as critical infrastructure began in August after hackers targeted the voter registration systems of ultimately more than 20 states in the months prior to the election.

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http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/U...-01-09-17-14-46

Hey Jeh I didn't realize that running the entire election system (federal. state. and local) was one of the powers designated to the federal government by the constitution

Jeh must be reading a verions of the constitution on an Etch A Sketch(if he's reading it at all)

From ZeroHedge

In Stunning Last Minute Power Grab, Obama Designates Election Systems As "Critical Infrastructure"
by Tyler Durden
Jan 6, 2017 11:48 PM

In a stunning last minute power grab by the Obama administration with just 14 days left in his Presidency, the Department of Homeland Security released a statement this evening officially declaring state election systems to be "critical infrastructure." The statement from DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson defines "election infrastructure" as "storage facilities, polling places, centralized vote tabulations locations, voter registration databases, voting machines" and all "other systems" to manage the election process...so pretty much everything.

Zitat

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I have determined that election infrastructure in this country should be designated as a subsector of the existing Government Facilities critical infrastructure sector. Given the vital role elections play in this country, it is clear that certain systems and assets of election infrastructure meet the definition of critical infrastructure, in fact and in law.

I have reached this determination so that election infrastructure will, on a more formal and enduring basis, be a priority for cybersecurity assistance and protections that the Department of Homeland Security provides to a range of private and public sector entities. By “election infrastructure,” we mean storage facilities, polling places, and centralized vote tabulations locations used to support the election process, and information and communications technology to include voter registration databases, voting machines, and other systems to manage the election process and report and display results on behalf of state and local governments.

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Of course, it's likely not a coincidence that the DHS made this announcement just hours after the "intelligence community" declassified their "Russian Hacking" propaganda which basically noted that RT has a very effective social media distribution platform while once again providing absolutely no actual evidence.

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http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-06...tical-infrastru

ohn Fund: Sneaky feds plot to grab state election power
Latest scheme in move to let U.S. government centralize America's voting systems
Published: 17 hours ago

iThe Obama administration is using the intelligence reports of Russian hacking influencing the 2016 campaign as the premise for asserting more power over the states in running elections, but a top election fraud expert says federal involvement would make elections more vulnerable to mischief and is really just a way to insert the federal government where it doesn’t belong.

Article I, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution is clear about the roles of the federal and state government in overseeing elections.

“The times, places, and manner of holding elections for senators and representatives shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by law make or alter such regulations,” it reads.

However, on Jan.6, the Obama administration – not Congress – decided to give the government more power in running elections. President Obama has been very busy cramming in many new regulations before he leaves office, but elections expert and columnist John Fund told WND and Radio America this one is particularly alarming.

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Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2017/01/john-fund-sne...zJK11loFOeHX.99