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Chairman Steil's full opening statement as prepared for delivery:
Today, the Committee on House Administration is continuing our oversight of federal elections.
For too long now, Americans have been concerned about the threat of foreign interference in our elections and attempts to destabilize democratic processes.
As Chairman of this Committee, I have worked to restore Americans’ faith in our elections, but foreign adversaries still have loopholes they can exploit to influence American elections.
Today we will explore two keys things.
There are current laws on the books that prohibit foreign interference.
We will explore how these laws are working in practice and how they are enforced.
Also, there are loopholes that exist in current law that still allow foreign actors to influence U.S. elections.
Let’s dive into how that is possible.
Federal law generally prohibits noncitizens or foreign businesses from directly giving money to candidates, campaigns, Super PACs or running ads in support of or against candidates.
However, it is currently legal for foreign nationals to indirectly funnel money through 501(c) organizations. These organizations can then channel that money to Super PACs or another 501(c) to directly help a candidate or influence a policy.
As Chairman of the Committee on House Administration, I introduced, and the Committee passed, the Preventing Foreign Interference in American Elections Act, that closes this loophole.
It is important that we continue to evaluate the current legal system and focus on strengthening the enforcement of our laws to prevent foreign interference in our elections.
On the other hand, we also have to address the illegal methods utilized by foreign adversaries to funnel illicit money into U.S. campaigns.
For example, it is currently illegal for someone to donate to a political campaign in the name of another person.
There are concerns of foreign adversaries utilizing the identities of unwitting U.S. citizens in order to donate to U.S. campaigns
We have shown there are vulnerabilities in our campaign finance system that would allow a foreign actor to use of a U.S. citizen as a straw donor in order to contribute.
This method would be very challenging to detect but may involve the use of gift cards in the name of a unwitting straw donor to avoid detection when facilitating these transactions.
Bad actors may also illegally exploit multiple unwitting identities to break large donations into smaller amounts, allowing them to circumvent individual contribution limits.
These efforts effectively disguise illegal donations and allow foreign actors to violate campaign finance laws that are currently in place.
In the last year, the Committee on House Administration has been reviewing online donation platform policies that have vulnerabilities that may allow foreign interference to occur.
I uncovered recently, major Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue did not automatically reject the use of prepaid gift cards or require users input the card verification value, or CVV, that could have been creating a loophole that foreign bad actors could have exploited.
In August, I wrote a letter to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, FinCEN, requesting information on its work to combat illicit election funding efforts, particularly from foreign actors.
To this day, the Committee has yet to receive a response to our questions or a briefing from FinCEN.
This is unacceptable.
In October, I requested information from the Treasury Department on potential election interference through fraudulent donations and asked to review any Suspicious Activity Reports related to ActBlue.
The Treasury Department has yet to allow this Committee or the House Oversight Committee chaired by James Comer to review the SARs.
Following my investigation into the methods used by foreign adversaries to funnel money into U.S. elections, I introduced the SHIELD Act which will prohibit political committees from accepting contributions without the disclosure of the CVV or from gift cards.
I’m pleased that this bill has passed the House and now awaits Senate passage.
Unfortunately, foreign interference in U.S. elections is not confined to the campaign finance space.
We have also seen foreign actors try to influence our elections through disinformation campaigns and cyberattacks.
Foreign-backed disinformation campaigns take advantage of First Amendment protections and spread false and misleading narratives to undermine trust, polarize voters, and sway public opinion.
This is a serious vulnerability.
Cyber attacks can illegally target election infrastructure, including voter registration databases or email systems of political campaigns, in an attempt to disrupt processes or steal sensitive information.
We saw an example of this during the most recent presidential election when President-Elect Trump’s campaign was allegedly hacked by Iranian nationals.
We must ensure that America’s election system is secure and fair.
Democrats and Republicans agree that elections should be free from foreign interference, this should not be a partisan issue.
It is imperative that we continue working to prevent foreign interference and it starts with closing the loopholes that exist in current law.
Throughout this Congress, this Committee has worked to improve Americans’ confidence in our elections system.
Again, today we will focus on laws that are currently on the books to prevent foreign interference, as well as explore current legal loopholes that exist.
However, there is still more work to be done.
I’d like to thank our witnesses for joining us today and I look forward to a robust conversation on these crucial issues.
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