During a high-profile meeting in California last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping told US President Joe Biden that there would not be any interference by China in the 2024 US presidential election.
The assurance was also reiterated by Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi to Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan during their meeting in Bangkok recently, two people familiar with the conversations told CNN.
The leaders met in California in November last year to ease historically high military and economic tensions between the two superpowers.
The potential for China to interfere in or influence US elections has repeatedly come up at senior-level meetings between the two nations in recent months, the source who was briefed on the matter said.
Those discussions signal just how fraught US-China relations have become, and how wary American officials still are of foreign election meddling after 2016, when Russian intelligence agencies hacked the Democratic National Committee and released emails to damage Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
Since then, Iranian, Cuban and Chinese agents have all been active in trying to influence US elections, according to public US intelligence reports. Though none of those efforts have been as aggressive as the 2016 Russian operation.
Even if China refrains from interfering in the 2024 election, Beijing’s hackers are still a potent force, with a foothold in key US infrastructure. For several months, US national security officials have publicly warned that Chinese cyber operatives have burrowed into computer networks in the maritime and transportation sectors — access that Beijing might use to disrupt any US military response to a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
China’s history of election meddling
China has traditionally taken a more passive role in trying to influence US elections than Russia, focusing on shaping a handful of congressional races, according to US intelligence officials. There are indications, however, that Chinese operatives have become more aggressive in targeting US voters and political candidates.
Since 2020, senior Chinese officials have issued broad directives to Chinese operatives to “intensify efforts to influence US policy and public opinion in China’s favor,” and senior Chinese officials have aimed to “magnify US societal divisions,” according to a US intelligence assessment declassified in December. Those influence efforts have included using fake social media accounts to attack US politicians online.
Those directives likely gave Chinese operatives “more freedom to operate” ahead of the 2022 midterms, according to the US intelligence document.
Microsoft warned in September that Chinese operatives had used AI-generated images of the Statue of Liberty and other symbols of American life to mimic US voters online and provoke discussion on divisive political issues.
Last week, a senior National Security Agency official told reporters that the agency had not yet seen signs of any notable new foreign influence operations aimed at the 2024 election. But US officials are preparing for the possibility that Russia, Iran, China and other foreign actors will try to sow discord among voters through propaganda, hacking or some other means.
“Between expanding geopolitical turmoil and the chaotic domestic political environment, there will be plenty of motivations and opportunities for a wide range of threat actors to interfere in this year’s election,” said Chris Krebs, who led the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s work to protect elections from foreign interference in 2020.
“Throw in AI-powered influence campaigns and 2024 might be unlike any prior election,” Krebs told CNN.
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