The U.S. Defense Department has ordered an intensive, five-week cyber and intelligence mobilization aimed at blocking foreign governments from hacking or manipulating the November midterm elections, a directive that pulls four military spy agencies into a joint operation with civilian election officials.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth signed the order on Sept. 28, tasking U.S. Cyber Command, the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency with prioritizing election protection from now through Nov. 3, when voters will fill all 435 House seats, 35 Senate seats and 36 governorships. Axios first reported the directive, which the Pentagon confirmed in a notice describing the mission as protecting the voting system and broader election infrastructure from foreign threats.
The order activates what officials described as the most advanced artificial intelligence capabilities yet deployed for election defense. Hegseth’s September 22 memo, which underpins the broader mobilization, lays out a three-part framework: prioritize intelligence and cyber capabilities to prevent foreign interference, direct the Defense Intelligence Enterprise to collect and produce threat intelligence within legal bounds, and mount joint Cyber Command–Homeland Security operations against attacks on election infrastructure.
“Protecting the ability to conduct free and fair elections is a no-fail mission,” Hegseth wrote in the memo. Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said federal, state and local authorities are working “in lockstep” with military cyber and intelligence teams to “identify, disrupt, and neutralize” foreign interference and expose malign influence operations.
The 36-day surge comes roughly two months after President Donald Trump alleged in a July 16 White House address that China had obtained 220 million U.S. voter files since the 2020 presidential race, calling it the “largest compromise of election data in history.” Beijing denied the claim. The White House subsequently released declassified documents, including a January 2020 National Intelligence Council memo assessing that Russia, China, Iran and North Korea had the capability to compromise that year’s election infrastructure.
Trump has warned of foreign election meddling since his first term. He told the AP in April 2017 and Fox News in April 2019 that Ukraine had sided with Hillary Clinton during the 2016 campaign, and argued at a September 2018 UN Security Council meeting that China was trying to interfere in that year’s midterms. The same month, he signed an executive order authorizing sanctions against foreign individuals and organizations found to have interfered in U.S. elections.
The current directive builds on a March 2025 executive order titled “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.” It also follows the Biden administration’s similar pre-election orders to Cyber Command and the NSA ahead of the 2022 midterms.
Command structure and precedent
Cyber Command and the NSA are both led by Gen. Joshua Rudd, who serves simultaneously as commander of the former and director of the latter. The two agencies ran a joint Election Security Group that shared intelligence on Russian and Iranian influence operations and led counterattacks from the 2020 presidential election through 2024.
During the 2018 midterms, Cyber Command cut off network access for the Internet Research Agency, the Kremlin-funded troll farm that U.S. officials say manipulated public opinion. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, part of the Department of Homeland Security, has separately unveiled an election infrastructure security plan for the current cycle.
Timing concerns
The Pentagon’s announcement arrived after early voting had already begun in some states. Andrew Shorka, who worked at Cyber Command during the 2020 presidential election, told CNN that election security operations require months of planning and interagency coordination, and that much of their impact occurs proactively, well before Election Day.
U.S. intelligence assessments following the 2020 election concluded that Russia ran influence operations designed to damage Joe Biden’s candidacy and undermine trust in the electoral system. Separate investigations by the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security found no evidence that foreign actors manipulated voting systems or altered results.
For the current midterms, the Pentagon has not publicly named specific adversary countries, but Hegseth’s order directs a whole-of-department response to hacking operations led by adversaries such as Russia and China. The mobilization represents one of the most concentrated uses of military cyber assets for a domestic election in U.S. history, compressing what officials acknowledge is normally a months-long preparation cycle into just over five weeks.
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