Last night, the FBI announced that both Iran and Russia are the culprits behind emails sent to Democratic voters, instructing them to not only switch to the Republican party but to also vote for President Donald Trump (R) as well. John Ratcliffe, the director of national intelligence, made the announcement last night, explaining that the emails were designed “to incite social unrest and damage President Trump.”
Ratcliffe explained that Russia and Iran had obtained American’s voter registration information, and that’s how the emails were being delivered. However, in the same news conference, Christopher. Wray, the FBI director, explained that there was no way for Iran or Russia to change any votes cast by Americans, asserting that “you should be confident that your vote counts.”
In a statement, Alireza Miryousefi, a spokesman for the Iranian Mission to the U.N., denied that Iran has had anything to do with interference in the election, slamming the United States by saying that “unlike the U.S., Iran does not interfere in other country’s elections.”
“The world has been witnessing U.S.’s own desperate public attempts to question the outcome of its own elections at the highest level,” he added, noting that “these accusations are nothing more than another scenario to undermine voter confidence in the security of the U.S. election and are absurd.”
Similarly, Dmitry Peskov, the spokesman for the Kremlin, commented in a press briefing that “the accusations are poured out every day, they are all absolutely groundless, they are not based on anything, rather it is a tribute to the internal political processes associated with the upcoming election.”
The issue is likely to take center stage at tonight’s presidential debate between President Trump and Vice President Joe Biden (D), who is also facing scrutiny for not responding to accusations regarding his son, Hunter Biden, and foreign business deals in Russia while Vice President Biden was in office.