Noise of ‘foreign interference’ in US elections: Trump’s claims create political uproar, questions raised on intelligence agencies themselves

There has once again been an earthquake in American politics. President Donald Trump, in a prime-time address, has seriously accused China of the biggest ‘data breach’ so far in the 2020 US presidential election. Trump claims that China had illegally obtained personal data of about 22 crore American voters. With this revelation, Trump has termed the top officials of his own intelligence agencies as ‘Deep State’ and accused them of hiding this information for years. Trump’s claim: ‘The biggest breach in election security’ Trump, while addressing the nation from the White House, claimed that China stole sensitive information like names, addresses, phone numbers and political preferences of American voters as part of a larger plan during the 2020 election cycle. The President alleges that China had created a ‘Data Exploitation Unit’ to use this data to influence the elections and mislead the American public. He termed it as ‘Shocking Vulnerabilities’ of the American election system and said that now he is making public the intelligence documents related to it so that the flaws of the election system can be rectified. The most shocking part of President Trump’s statements against intelligence agencies is his distrust towards his own intelligence agencies. He alleged that ‘Rogue Bureaucrats’ of the CIA, FBI and other intelligence departments deliberately kept this interference by China hidden from the President and the American public. Trump has demanded that the officials involved in this ‘cover-up’ be investigated, fired and criminally prosecuted. He clearly said that he does not trust those institutions which suppressed this big information related to the security of the country. Are these allegations politically motivated? These claims of Trump are being linked to the mid-term elections to be held in America in the coming November. Critics and Democratic leaders allege that through these ‘doubt-raising’ statements, Trump is reviving old claims of his defeat and wants to create distrust in the election process in the minds of voters. Experts say the 2021 intelligence report found no concrete confirmation that any foreign power influenced the election results or voting machines. China has also rejected these allegations outright and said that it never interferes in America’s internal affairs or elections. New election law: Advocating ‘SAVE America Act’ In his address, Trump appealed to immediately pass the ‘SAVE America Act’. The proposed legislation aims to make the voting process more stringent, including stricter rules regarding photo ID and citizenship. The President says these steps are essential to restoring election integrity. However, experts believe that all this could be part of a larger strategy to gain electoral advantage so that in the coming elections a section of the public will question the transparency of the system.