(The Daily Signal) — President Donald Trump announced the release of declassified documents he said are evidence that China has been meddling in U.S. elections by hacking into voter registration databases and by other means.
Trump, who spoke Thursday evening in a primetime address to the nation, said the “deep state” had this information and suppressed it from the president and Congress.
“They kept it secret and hidden. Did not disclose to me or Congress,” Trump said.
Trump said the declassified information shows “shocking vulnerabilities in our election infrastructure.
“No country can be great without fair and honest elections,” Trump said. “You have to trust your country because if there can be no trust, there can be no greatness.”
The president said that China conducted a massive hacking of voter registration information.
“The People’s Republic of China carried out what is believed to be the largest compromise of election data in history, resulting in China’s illicit acquisition of 220 million U.S. voter files,” Trump said.
He said the information includes names, addresses, phone numbers, political party preferences, and other data.
“This data loss presents an unprecedented election security nightmare,” the president added.
At least a portion of the declassified information was released Thursday night.
The point of the hacking, according to Trump, was to steal information about thousands of voters. He also said information from 2018 and 2019 shows that Chinese operatives wanted to harm Trump so he would be forced to resign or be defeated in his reelection bid.
“The Chinese government wanted the U.S. president to lose the next election and the reason they wanted me to lose is because they knew I was wise to them, charged them billions in tariffs, and built the largest military in the world,” Trump said.
Trump, who has long disputed his 2020 loss to Joe Biden, also said the FBI found China attempted to manufacture ballots in favor of Biden.
“Raw intelligence obtained by the FBI in 2020, yet buried by rogue bureaucrats, stated that China’s activities even included an attempt to manufacture illegal ballots for Joe Biden,” Trump said.
The president further said China paid U.S. journalists to write negative stories about him during his first term.
“The Chinese government sought to identify U.S. journalists who had reported negatively on the U.S. president and pay them large sums of money to write more negative articles about him, as many as they could, and they did not care what they said,” Trump asserted.
Trump said elections were “vulnerable and easily compromised and people within our government knew that.”
The Department of Homeland Security has information showing about 278,000 registered voters are foreigners, Trump said.
“According to the DHS review, state voter rolls and public records, they identified approximately 278,000 non-citizens who are registered to vote in federal elections,” Trump said. “Since Democrat states refused to share their voter files, the real number is actually much higher than that.”
The address comes as Trump is pushing Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, which would require photo identification to vote and proof of citizenship to register to vote. The president, as he concluded his remarks, made a passionate plea for Congress to pass the legislation.
In March 2021, during the early months of the Biden administration, the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security issued a joint report that asserted China considered trying to influence the presidential election but backed off. It further said, “No evidence found that a foreign government manipulated any election results.”
Still, there have been documented cases of China election meddling and hacking.
In the 2024 campaign, FBI officials said Chinese government operatives targeted the phones of candidates, including now-President Trump, now-Vice President JD Vance, and individuals associated with then-Vice President Kamala Harris.
A Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security report released in December 2023 found Chinese cyber actors collected publicly available voter information during the 2022 election.
In July 2024, the Justice Department Office of Inspector General issued a report that described China as one of several foreign governments that conducted malign influence campaigns directed at U.S. elections. This included using fake online personas and promoting propaganda
This article was originally published by The Daily Signal.
Fred Lucas | The Daily Signal
Fred Lucas is chief national affairs correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of "The Right Side of History" podcast. Lucas is also the author of "Abuse of Power: Inside The Three-Year Campaign to Impeach Donald Trump."
