Clairborne greeted Gordon in the lobby and took him through security into an office suite deep inside the building, then took his suit jacket off to expose the snub-nosed Glock 19 handgun he wore like a fashion appendage. He was around six-foot-two and made Gordon feel like some middle school sixty-pound weakling.
“This is my partner, Rone,” he said, introducing a bearded man wearing jeans and a button-down blue shirt stretched to the limits of his biceps. It was easy to imagine the pair of them in desert camo gear, carrying M4s.
“So what’s this about a potential breach?” he drawled.
Gordon explained what he had discovered that morning.
“Did this come from ALBERT?” Clairborne asked.
ALBERT was a private network monitoring system that the Department of Homeland Security recommended state and local governments join, since it reduced the number of brush fires the FBI had to put out.
“We don’t subscribe to ALBERT. We do our own monitoring,” Gordon said.
“Well, ALBERT would have provided us with a baseline, since it rejects most known network anomalies amateur netsec guys think are security breaches.”
Gordon was used to the government gobbledygook and couldn’t help but pick up the underlying disdain dripping from Clairborne’s words.
“Did you take this to Lisa Rasmussen?” he went on.
“I have,” Gordon said.
“And?”
“She feels as you do, apparently, there’s no there there.”
“So what else is there to discuss?” Clairborne exchanged a frustrated smirk with Rone, who was doodling on a yellow legal pad.
“Actually, a lot,” Gordon said. “There’s a lot of there there. First of all, the server they attempted to penetrate contains an FTP folder with all the instruction manuals and maintenance records of our voting machines. Every time Dominant Technologies announces a patch, we keep a record of when it was installed and who installed it.”
“Was there any penetration? Any data exfil?”
“Not that I could see.”
“Do any damage?”
“Not yet.”
“Maybe you’ve got a concerned citizen worried you guys are not doing your job. Some 300-pound kid in a basement having fun.”
“It’s not a joke, sir.”
“Did you install the latest security patch from the manufacturer? It should have gone out last month.”
“I did. I worked on that personally with their rep and redid the hash.”
“Then you’re chasing ghosts, brother. Come back when you have an actual penetration.”
“With all due respect, Mr. Clairborne, I think you should have a look at that Russian IP address.”
“Russian, really?”
He cast a cursory glance at the print-out Gordon had placed on his desk. “This looks like a Washington, DC, server, not a Russian one.”
“If you ping that server, it resolves to a dot RU domain name,” he said.
Rone picked up the printout, showing interest for the first time. “Really?” he said.
“Really,” Gordon agreed.
“Alright, we’ll have a look,” Clairborne said.
When he had escorted Gordon back through security, he stopped at the front office to speak with his administrator.
“Did my guy from the Maryland state election board sign in?”
She looked through her paperwork. “Here he is, sir. Utz, right?”
“That’s him.”
Damn, Clairborne thought. He was going to have to report this one up the food chain.
23
The pundits and pollsters were all over the Sunday talk shows, less than forty-eight hours before the polls opened in most of the country. CNN’s Rick Hoglan stood in front of the “Magic Board,” the computer-generated electoral map the network used to post results as they came in county by county across the nation.
“This is how things turned out when America woke up the day after the 2016 election,” he said, tapping the lower left corner of the screen. “Trump won 306 electoral votes to Clinton’s 232. But look what happens if you take those same numbers as a base line, and just Pennsylvania and Florida go Democrat.” He tapped the right side of the screen and flipped the two states from red to blue. “This puts the Democrats over the top with 281 electoral votes to Trump’s 257. Now if North Carolina also flips, which the polls show is quite likely, that gives the Democrats 296 electoral votes. And don’t forget, you’ve still got tight races in Arizona, Wisconsin, and Michigan, all of which went for Trump in 2016. If those all break for the Democrats, you’re looking at a 333 to 205 vote Democratic electoral college blow-out.”
“How likely do you think that is, Rick?” Keith Cobb asked. Cobb was the designated anchor for the network’s election coverage. Sober, slow to arouse, he worked hard at conveying an aura of impartiality, which for CNN was an accomplishment.
“It’s still two days before voters go to the polls. But I think it’s a safe bet that the Democrats win Florida, where Governor Tomlinson has maintained a three-point edge in the polls for the past six weeks, and where activist groups have been harvesting absentee ballots for several weeks. If all the other states vote the same as in 2016, that puts Democrats at 261, just nine votes shy of victory. They don’t even have to win Pennsylvania to get over the top. Any one of these rust-belt states,” Hoglan said, flicking first Wisconsin, then Michigan, then Ohio, from red to blue, “would put them over 270. So would North Carolina, or even Georgia, which almost went Democratic in the 2018 governor’s race, as you recall.”
“That’s right, Rick. We’ll be having the Democratic candidate in that race, Stacey Abrams, on the show a little later to tell us how Governor Tomlinson fares in the Peach Tree state.”
On Fox News Sunday, Matt Hall was holding up a whiteboard showing a Trump re-election victory with 284 votes. A professional pundit who plunged into the weeds of election statistics, he was also an amateur history buff and loved to dig out obscure comparisons from elections past. Host Benjamin Bryant had paired him on the Sunday panel with Galen Beaty and Kristina Brower, co-anchors of the network’s election team. Beaty was standing in front of the Fox News version of the “Magic Board.” He had the chiseled good looks of a movie star, playing a journalist on TV—and a good one, at that. While not devoid of humor, he had a boyish sincerity about him.
“I don’t have to tell you, Matt,” Beaty was saying, “if just a couple of these swing states go the other way, the election goes to Governor Tomlinson and the Democrats.”
“Sure. Just start with Pennsylvania and Florida. If they flip just those two and win all the other states that Hillary won in 2016, they’re at 281. They can even afford to lose Nevada’s seven votes, which Clinton won in 2016, and come out with 275, or five more than they need for victory. I just don’t think that’s going to happen.”
Hall went on to explain that the early voting numbers in Florida and Pennsylvania weren’t showing a big run-up in voter turnout for the Democrats, which they needed if they were going to flip them. “Governor Tomlinson needs sixty-five percent African-American turnout in Philadelphia if she’s going to have any chance of winning the state, and so far we just aren’t seeing that,” he said. “Remember, unemployment in the African-American community reached the lowest level in history last year under President Trump, and it’s recovered well from the coronavirus recession. Down in Florida, early voting in the Democrat strongholds in Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, and Broward Counties has been anemic, so I’d have to say things look pretty solid there for the president as well.”
“Alright,” said Bryant, the show host. “So now it’s time to put your money where your mouths are. This will be the last time this year we’ll be playing election sweepstakes on Fox News Sunday. Where do you place your hundred dollars. Matt?”
“My money is going on Trump,
Benjamin. I’m all in.”
“All one hundred?”
“That’s right.”
“Well, that’s saying something. How about you, Kristina?”
“I’m going to hedge just a little bit, Benjamin. I’m putting sixty-five dollars on Trump, and thirty-five on Tomlinson.”
“Galen?”
“I’m going to join Kristina with sixty-five on Trump. But I’m only putting twenty-five on Governor Tomlinson and the other ten as our good friend Charles Krauthammer used to do.”
“Ah yes,” said Bryant. “On wine, women, and song.”
“Which this year means a contested election, Benjamin. We’re forty-eight hours away, and if history teaches us anything, it’s that the only poll that counts is the one on Election Day, and I’ll wager that one’s going to be very close.”
Granger had been watching the shows in the study of his Georgetown mansion. What does this guy know? he wondered. He made a note to call Navid on the blue line. There mustn’t be any fingerprints. And no leaks.
24
Nelson Aguilar was still clearing the dishes from breakfast at 7:30 AM on Monday morning when the doorbell rang. Brady had left for the bus a half hour earlier and planned to join him at campaign headquarters later that afternoon with a couple of friends from Wheaton High School—not wearing his hat as IT manager, but as high school recruiter. Camilla Broadstreet, the campaign’s volunteer coordinator, was always eager to get more high schoolers engaged in the campaign. If they talked up the candidate at home, there was a greater likelihood their parents would vote for him, she said. Even in Democrat households.
It was way too early for the Crocodile or Annie to show up. Even if Annie came across on the InterCounty Connector, she still had that horrible stretch on I-270 from Urbana down to Gaithersburg, which was jammed from 7:00 AM until 9:00 AM. The Crocodile also lived up I-270, but on the other side of Frederick. Even though tomorrow was Election Day, both of them waited until after the morning rush hour to head down to Montgomery County.
As he turned into the living room, he saw the unmarked white Ford Fusion parked outside before he saw the two men at his front door. When he opened the door, both of them had badges in their hands.
“Mr. Aguilar? Special agents Jim Clairborne and Tyrone Masterson, sir. FBI. Do you have a minute? We have a security matter that’s come to our attention we’d like to discuss with you.”
“Sure. Sure. Of course,” he said, ushering them inside.
The two men were giants. Both of them were wearing shoulder holsters that made their suit jackets appear even tighter than they were, and when they sat down they carefully unbuttoned them and pressed down the lapels to keep their weapons out of sight. They wore blue jeans beneath the suit jackets, and the one called Tyrone was wearing jogging shoes. Neither one of them wore a tie.
Clairborne did all the talking. As a political candidate, Aguilar was aware that U.S. elections had attracted quite a bit of attention from foreign actors, including some with impressive computer skills. They hadn’t detected any breach of his campaign—yet, he said. But they wanted to put him on notice and urged him to hire a computer security specialist if he hadn’t already done so.
“I’ve got one,” Aguilar said. “One of the best.”
“Do you mind if you put us in touch with that person?” Clairborne said. “Perhaps we could sit down with them later this morning?”
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” Aguilar said. “It’s my son. He’s in high school until three PM.”
Aguilar didn’t like the look the two agents shared at the mention of Brady. Something about this visit didn’t smell right.
“Is this about the spear-phishing emails?” he asked. “Brady mentioned that last week, but I didn’t pay it much mind.”
The two FBI agents exchanged another glance, this one verging on disbelief, as if they suspected him of trying to mislead them.
“Actually it was something else we wanted to discuss with you,” Clairborne said. “We’ve received a complaint from the State Board of Elections about an attempted computer breach of the state voter registration database. When we ran a trace on the IP address, it resolved to a server in this neighborhood.”
“Is everything okay?” Aguilar said. “You know that early voting ended last Friday. As far as I know, there haven’t been any reports of irregularities.”
“So far, we are calling this an attempted break-in. Not an actual breach. It may have been carried out by a foreign actor, or by an activist in the neighborhood. Whoever it is, they need to know it’s a class three felony to tamper with the voter rolls.”
Aguilar was starting to get indignant. “Why are you telling me this?” he asked icily.
“We’d like you to put the word out that we are onto it,” Clairborne said. “You know teenagers these days…”
“Teenagers, what?” he said.
“They think that just because they are sitting at home behind closed doors that no one can see what they are doing.”
“Are you making an accusation?”
“No, no, Mr. Aguilar,” Clairborne said. “But kids like that tend to know each other, even if they’ve never met face-to-face. If Brady puts the word out, we’re hoping these efforts will stop before any harm is done.”
“Thank you, Mr. Clairborne,” Aguilar said. “I will be sure to raise this with my campaign people later this morning. Now if you’ll excuse me, I must get ready to leave. I go on air in thirty minutes.”
He showed them the door, and watched them go down the steps to their car before he let it fall shut. This is outrageous, he thought. Do these guys really think I’m afraid of the law, that they can intimidate me like that? What century are they living in?
25
The Aguilar campaign headquarters took up two whole floors of a corner building, just across the street from the Wheaton mall. Before they had moved in, a year earlier, the space had been rented out to Provident Bank. Aguilar owned the entire six-story building and declared the rent to the Federal Election Commission as an in-kind contribution. It gave the campaign instant visibility and a large, street-level space where the curious could walk in to meet the candidate.
Aguilar had summoned them into the conference room to explain the visit he had received that morning from the FBI, and when Brady understood what had happened, he burst out in tears.
“Dad, it wasn’t me!”
“I know that, chico.”
“No, seriously, Dad. I’d never be so dumb as to do that kind of thing from home. Mom would be rolling over in her grave.”
The evocation of Graciella made Aguilar laugh. “His mother was chief of network security for PDVSA before she left Venezuela,” he said, pronouncing the name peydey-besa. “That’s the state-owned oil company. Once she came here, she had to start all over again and got degrees in computer science from College Park, and later, from Johns Hopkins. I guess she was very good at this kind of thing.”
“She was the best, Dad. Still is.”
Aguilar crossed himself and said a silent prayer. Annie had wrapped an arm around Brady and could feel him grow calm again.
“So what do you think happened?”
“I’ve been spoofed. Somebody spoofed me, impersonated my computer, my IP address.”
“Is that possible?
“It’s not easy, but it’s possible if you get access to the root servers in the area.”
“Ken, what do you know about this kind of thing?” he asked the Crocodile.
“Whoa, boss. You’re looking at the expert,” he said, indicating Brady.
“What are root servers?” he asked Brady.
“It’s basically the internet backbone. The big computers that handle all network traffic and assign domain names to smaller providers. It’s kind of like a gigantic telephone switchboard.”
“So it’s the telecoms?”
“No, Dad. It’s the government. Our government. Somebody got into the root server and pretended to be me. I bet it was the same Russian server that sent the spear-phishing emails to the campaign.”
“Oh my God,” Annie said. “This is all my fault.”
“What do you mean?” Aguilar said.
“I told Gordon about the spear-phishing emails. That got him running system tests on the state voter database. And that’s when he found they had been penetrated—or at least, that someone was trying to penetrate them—and he went to the FBI.”
The Crocodile smirked. “So it’s not just a guy.”
“I never said he was,” Annie said.
“So this Gordon works on computer security for the state board of elections?”
“Yes. Actually, he is in charge of computer security for the state.”
Annie explained as best she could what Gordon had told her about the computer intrusion, and the fact that the intruder had also spoofed the IP address of his computer to make it look like it was coming from somewhere in Wheaton when actually it resolved to a dot RU address. “That’s Russia,” she said.
Brady jumped up. “That’s the same thing that happened to us, Dad! The spear-phishing emails resolved to a dot RU address.”
Aguilar was troubled by what he thought he understood of what they were saying.
“So if you could see that someone from Russia had spoofed their IP address, and Gordon—right, Annie? Gordon?—could see that, too, why couldn’t the FBI? Why did they say that the hack on the state voter database came from a local IP address? Is their technology so backward they couldn’t see what you all could see?”
The Election Heist Page 10