American intelligence officials issued a public warning on Friday that China was “expanding its influence efforts” in the United States ahead of the presidential election, along with Russia and Iran, but Democrats briefed on the matter said the threat was far more urgent than what the administration described.
The warning came from William R. Evanina, the director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, in a statement 100 days before Americans go to the polls. “We’re primarily concerned with China, Russia and Iran — although other nation-states and nonstate actors could also do harm to our electoral process,” the statement said.
In a statement issued a few hours later, Speaker Nancy Pelosi was joined by the Senate Democratic leader, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, and two key Democrats on intelligence oversight committees, Senator Mark Warner of Virginia and Representative Adam B. Schiff of California, in saying that the descriptions of malign activity were “so generic as to be almost meaningless.”
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