Politics

Washington — A joint intelligence bulletin issued by the Department of Homeland Security and FBI warned of the potential for domestic violent extremists “with election-related grievances” to target political candidates and elected officials in the coming weeks.

The bulletin, which CBS News obtained, is dated Oct. 3 and says domestic extremists “pose a threat of violence to a range of targets directly and indirectly associated with elections through at least the presidential inauguration” on Jan. 20, 2025. 

Election workers, judicial personnel involved in election-related court cases, members of the media, political party representatives and perceived political opponents are also potential targets. Publicly accessible venues, including voting locations and campaign events, also make “attractive targets,” the bulletin says, noting the attempted assassination against former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13. 

It also refers to the second assassination attempt against the Republican presidential nominee at his private golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sept. 15, saying that “threat actors may seek to target individuals at their private residences or other non-public locations.”

Domestic extremists “could seek to use a range of violent or disruptive tactics against these targets, including but not limited to physical attacks, threats of violence, swatting and doxing, mailing or otherwise delivering suspicious items, arson, and other means of property destruction,” according to the bulletin. 

There have already been a number of election-related threats during the 2024 campaign, including letters containing white powder sent to election officials, fake bomb threats to state capitol buildings and “swatting” calls, in which a caller makes a false crime report intended to draw law enforcement to people’s homes.

“In many of these incidents, the perpetrators and their motives remain under investigation, but their actions likely are intended to instill fear and disrupt election operations,” the bulletin says.

The bulletin also notes there has been an increase in threats to election workers in recent months which tends “to correlate with jurisdictions where results are contested via recounts, audits, or public election disputes.” 

A senior DHS official told CBS News on Wednesday that there are concerns that election workers will be targeted on Election Day “to try to derail the process that those workers have a hand in overseeing.”

Domestic extremists aren’t the only threat to the democratic process. Federal law enforcement officials have long warned about foreign election interference from Russia, China and Iran.

Nation states have become “increasingly sophisticated” and more effective at using new technologies such as artificial intelligence to “broaden the scope and scale of those efforts,” the DHS official said. 

Matthew Olsen, who leads the Justice Department’s National Security Division, recently told CBS News that Russia, Iran and China “are looking at ways at which they can change the outcome of our election, or to find issues that divide us in ways that support their national interests at the expense of ours.” 

Canadian diplomats have quietly but frequently raising concerns over foreign interference and surveillance with their Chinese counterparts over the past two years, newly-released documents show.

A document published by the foreign interference commission Friday shows a total of 48 “representations” to People’s Republic of China (PRC) officials since September 2022. The general topic of “foreign interference” has been raised 31 times in total, including four formal diplomatic letters.

The document also shows Canadian officials raised Chinese overseas “police stations” 20 times, surveillance balloons twice, and two meetings on a former PRC diplomat, Zhao Wei, who was expelled from Canada over foreign interference concerns.

It’s a quieter part of the federal government’s overall response to foreign interference — clandestine operations aimed at shaping Canadian domestic politics chiefly from the PRC, but also countries like India, Iran and Russia.

But the document shows that, away from the public eye, Chinese officials were well aware the federal government was concerned about their alleged meddling in Canadian affairs.

David Morrison, the deputy minister of international trade and former national security adviser to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, told the commission that “maintain(ing) a live, ongoing discussion with foreign states, even adversarial ones” is a central aspect of addressing foreign interference.

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“This, according to Mr. Morrison, is the essence of diplomacy: how you work a relationship with a government that may be adversarial, dealing with a diversity of topics and managing the to-and-fro, cut-and-thrust of the relationship,” Morrison told commission lawyers.

Occasionally, those diplomatic exchanges do make headlines — like when Trudeau had a testy exchange with Chinese President Xi Jinping about the issue on the margins of a G20 summit in 2022. Xi apparently took issue with details about the two leaders’ discussion of foreign interference being “leaked” to Canadian media.

A spokesperson for China’s foreign affairs department called the allegations of foreign interference “nonsense” at the time.

Details and documents released by the foreign interference commission, led by Québec appeals court Justice Marie-Josée Hogue, tell a different story.

Hogue’s inquiry is nearing the end of its second phase of public testimony by senior security officials, public servants and politicians on interference in the 2019 and 2021 general elections.

The inquiry was prompted by media reports, first by Global News, about the extent of foreign interference in Canadian democracy and the repeated warnings Trudeau’s government had on the issue.

In her preliminary report released in May, Hogue confirmed there were attempts by foreign powers to interfere in both the 2019 and 2021 federal elections — but that Canadians ultimately decided both contests.

Hogue’s findings, along with the assessment of multiple Canadian security and intelligence agencies, is that China’s government is the most significant threat in foreign interference operations.

The commission will continue to hear testimony for the next two weeks, including from senior bureaucrats, political staff and cabinet ministers — including Trudeau himself on Oct. 16.

With the next federal election looming on the horizon, Hogue’s final report on foreign interference is due by the end of the year.

&copy 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

The U.S. military struck more than a dozen Houthi targets in Yemen Friday, going after weapons systems, bases and other equipment belonging to the Iranian-backed rebels, U.S. officials confirmed.

Military aircraft and warships bombed Houthi strongholds at approximately five locations, according to the officials.

Seven strikes hit the airport in Hodeida, a major port city, and the Katheib area, which has a Houthi-controlled military base, Houthi media said. Four more strikes hit the Seiyana area in Sanaa, the capital, and two strikes hit the Dhamar province. The Houthi media office also reported three air raids in Bayda province, southeast of Sanaa.

The strikes came days after the Houthis threatened “escalating military operations” targeting Israel after they apparently shot down a U.S. military drone flying over Yemen. Last week, the group claimed responsibility for an attack targeting American warships.

The rebels fired more than a half dozen ballistic missiles and anti-ship cruise missiles and two drones at three U.S. ships that were traveling through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, but all were intercepted by the Navy destroyers, according to several U.S. officials.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details not yet publicly released.

Houthis have targeted more than 80 merchant vessels with missiles and drones since the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza started last October. They have seized one vessel and sunk two in the campaign that has also killed four sailors.

Other missiles and drones have either been intercepted by a U.S.-led coalition in the Red Sea or failed to reach their targets, which have included Western military vessels.

The group has maintained that they target ships linked to Israel, the U.S. or the United Kingdom to force an end to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza. However, many of the ships attacked have little or no connection to the conflict, including some bound for Iran.