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The FBI says it has no evidence of any coordinated fraud schemes related to voting by mail this year, undercutting repeated claims by President Donald Trump and his camp about what they've called security problems.

That disclosure was made in an election security briefing for reporters on Wednesday by high-ranking officials from the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. 

Normally, such a statement would not be notable, since 

 have long said there is no widespread fraud issue in American elections.

But Trump, supporters and aides including Attorney General William Barr have cast doubt on the security of mail ballots as it has become clear that 

 may use them to vote this election season because of the coronavirus disaster. 

 could attempt to counterfeit ballots and send them in to interfere with counting and that mail voting expansions will be "ripe with fraud" and a way for Democrats to "steal the election from the Republicans."

But national security officials rejected those theories in the Wednesday briefing, saying they have not seen a coordinated fraud effort and noting how difficult such an effort would be, considering the decentralized nature of U.S. elections. 

The national security officials briefed the media on the condition they not be identified.

State and local elections officials also have affirmed the 

 required with such a scheme, saying often that 

 around the use of mailed ballots is more of an issue than fraud.

When asked directly about Trump's claims around foreign countries' forging or counterfeiting ballots, an FBI official said Wednesday that the agency has "no information about any nation state" engaging in any effort to undermine any aspect of mail voting.

, however, that a number of foreign countries, including Russia, China and Iran, continue to engage in overt and covert influence operations aimed at the 2020 presidential race.

Although the mail-in ballot interference thesis isn't supported by evidence, national security officials say, the foreign governments are attempting to sow chaos among American voters — but by launching cyberattacks and 

taking other actions aimed at interceding

The degrees of danger posed by those actors is debated; Democrats, for example, argue that the intelligence community is abetting Trump's desire to muddy the waters by 

 in associating lesser efforts by China and Iran with what they argue are the much more serious ones by Russia.

A former top U.S. spymaster, Sue Gordon, 

 that she would put the Russians "first on the list."

 The federal officials also were set to convene a classified threat landscape briefing for election officials on Wednesday afternoon. 

Politics and Government News

Election 2020

Miles Parks

Author

Although the president continues to push unverified theories of widespread fraud or foreign interference, the FBI says it has no reporting to suggest the threat is real.

There's no evidence supporting Trump's mail ballot warnings, FBI says

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