by Kathy Foster
Washington County Supervisor of Elections Carol Finch Rudd referred to information desiminated by the Florida State Association of Supervisors of Elections when asked about the allegations this week.
That statement is shown below:
Every Supervisor of Elections in the State of Florida is taking the security of our elections very seriously. No supervisor has had contact with Senator Nelson since they received a joint letter from Senator Nelson and Senator Rubio in early July. In neither that letter, nor in the referenced Senate Intelligence Report, were there any details of specific counties having Russians “in Florida’s elections records.”
Since being declared critical instrastrucutre, Florida’s supervisors have worked with the Department of Homeland Security, the Center for Internet Security, the Florida Department of Law Enforcment, the Florida Agncy for State Technology, our vendors, and other partners to assess our risks, identify vulnerabilities, and better-secure our elections.
Money provided by the Department of State, along with the new federal money from the recent HAVA Cybersecurity Grant, is currently being used to fund important upgrades and education efforts with the common goal of securing our elections.
Much of what the new HAVA money will allow us to do must now be done while we are in the middle of conducting a statewide election – hardly the most opportune time to make sweeping changes to our operations. All we can do, with the limited resoucres and compressed schedule that we now find ourselves working within, is measure our security posture against established standards and take the actions our resources allow to reduce or mitigate known risks.