National Security Advisor John Bolton said the U.S. is developing a variety of options to respond to any foreign interference in future U.S. elections and warned Russia it will pay a significant cost if it does so, in a Tuesday morning interview on Fox & Friends.
“We’re working on it, and in general terms what that involves is making sure that Russia and others know the cost they will bear if they try to meddle in our elections would be significantly greater than whatever cost they impose on us,” Bolton warned starkly.
The national security advisor’s warning comes just a week after the nation’s top intelligence officials delivered a briefing outlining President Donald Trump’s efforts to stop future election meddling. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats revealed that Russian efforts to interfere in the 2018 midterm elections is not yet at the levels of 2016 election and that they are not trying to help any particular party Thursday.
“Relative to what we have seen for the midterm elections, it is not the type of robust campaign that we assessed in the 2016 election. We know that through decades Russia has tried to use its propaganda and methods to sew discord in America,” Coats admitted. “They stepped up their game big time in 2016. We have not seen that kind of robust effort from them so far.”
Coats warned, however, “as I mentioned publicly, just a few weeks ago, we’re only one keyboard click away from finding out something that we don’t — haven’t seen up to this particular point in time. But right now, we have not seen that.”
The DNI continued that Russian efforts are not directed to one particular party.