Election officials say they’re working to ensure security for June 2 primary

With the June 2 primary a week away, Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate said Tuesday that Iowa state officials are working with federal offices and the National Guard to ensure election integrity.

Pate was joined by officials from the Iowa Department of Public Safety, Iowa Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management as well as Iowa National Guard, the FBI and county auditors at the Iowa National Guard Emergency Operations Center in Johnston for the news conference.

The secretary of state, the top elections official in Iowa, called election security “a race without a finish line,” and said his office, alongside the state and federal partners, have been working year-round to ensure Iowans can cast their ballot with confidence.

“I want Iowans to hear this clearly: When you cast your vote in June for the primary, your vote will be counted fairly, accurately, and securely,” Pate said. “An Iowa Poll found that 91% of respondents have confidence in our election results. This didn’t happen by accident. It’s a result of years of hard work fine-tuning our processes and adding new layers of election security as technology advances and the landscape changes. … As election officials, we hope for the best, but we prepare for the worst, and that preparation is exactly what you’re seeing here today.”

The officials hosted the press availability at the Johnston National Guard building, where staff from the various agencies will gather again on the day of the primary election, Tuesday, June 2, to monitor potential threats or problems that arise in the state’s elections. The officials did not address the potential for President Donald Trump and his administration about to deploy National Guard or immigration enforcement agents to polling places on Election Day.

John Benson, director of the state Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, said, “a good day in here is we’ll be bored.”

“If we’re bored, we’re having a great day at the election,” Benson said. “There’s nothing going on. I’m completely happy to have my people here all day, and have nothing for them to do that’s related to the election. But if something does happen, we can have those conversations with our partners right here, and figure out what we need to do to address any situations that do arise.”

Shane Dwyer, chief information security officer at the state Department of Management’s Division of Information Technology, said Iowans should know there are “security professionals on duty around the clock, before, during, and after Election Day” making sure the election process is running correctly and without interference.

“The Department of Management works shoulder to shoulder with county election offices, federal partners, local law enforcement, and Iowa National Guard, all coordinated, all focused on one goal, making sure your vote counts and your voice is heard,” Dwyer said. “We train for this all year long — real exercises, real scenarios, real partners working together — so that when Election Day comes, everyone knows exactly what to do, and the technology is protecting Iowa’s elections is monitored continuously,” Dwyer said. “Any unusual activity is flagged, investigated, and addressed. Iowans can be confident that dedicated professionals are on duty, and the focus on keeping the process secure.”

Before most Iowa elections, Pate and officials with other entities working on election security share information with Iowans on the steps being taken to ensure the integrity of the state’s elections. But the coalition of officials gathered at the Tuesday did not include a representative from Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency — often referred to as CISA — with which the state has often worked in the past on cybersecurity and other election security efforts.

Pate said the Iowa election team has “learned a lot during our time in partnering with CISA, and we’ve taken those skills and built a pretty independent operation here with the team you see.”

“We still receive other federal assistance in different ways, so I’m pretty comfortable with what we have,” Pate said. “In fact, I look forward to building on what we have here today, but I don’t think a lot is going to change. Again, elections aren’t just next week — we’ve been working on this all year. We’ve done a series of tabletop exercises. This is something we started to learn from the CISA folks, but bringing our law enforcement partners in, with our Homeland Security people and our County Emergency people, and all the other people involved, trying to anticipate all the scenarios that could happen in an election. So I’m really comfortable with where we’re at.”

Early voting is already underway in Iowa for the June 2 primary elections. Pate said early voter participation is “a little behind last year’s” pace, but noted that voter participation in primaries is a “unique” situation because individual candidates’ campaigns, not political parties, are the entities driving voter turnout.

With several contested primaries including the primary for Iowa’s GOP gubernatorial nominee, Republican and Democratic nominees for the U.S. Senate race and various congressional candidates, Pate said he suspects “there’ll be more activity here this week, pushing that out.”

“This is a pretty important election primary,” Pate said. “Quite often in the fall election, you’ll get people say, ‘hey, I’m not a big fan of the Republican or Democrat candidate for a certain office,’ and I got to go, ‘well, where were you at in June? ‘I mean, we had a bunch of people running, you had a lot of opportunities. So, I hope Iowans pay attention to that, make a plan, and be successful in voting.”

Iowans can find more information about participating in the primary election on the Secretary of State’s website and through our voter guide.