Secretary of State warns federal cuts to ISACs, CISA staffing create ‘‘uncertainty and risk’’ for Washington elections

At a Feb. 14 briefing to the State Government & Tribal Relations Committee, Secretary of State Steve Hobbs and Kylie Zabel, director of the Information Security and Response Division, warned that recent federal actions have reduced election-security support and created uncertainty for state and local election offices.

Hobbs described a pattern of foreign campaigns and cyber actors targeting U.S. election systems and said federal intelligence sharing and technical assistance have been critical partners. "Elections are the foundation of our democracy," Hobbs said, urging a whole-of-society approach to defend them. He told lawmakers the federal government once alerted Washington to Russian IP addresses receiving state data and that federal notice allowed the state to respond quickly to a Clark County cyber…