>> members are responsible for muting and un-muting themselves. if we have noticed you have not unmuted yourself, i will ask if you would like the staff to unmute you.

if you approve by nodding, staff will unmute your microphone. the five-minute clause still applies. if there's a technology issue, we will move to the next member, and you will retain the balance of your time. you will notice the clock on your screen, indicating how much time you have remaining. at 30 seconds remaining, i will tap the gavel to remind members that their time has almost expired. when your time is expired, i will begin to recognize the next member. we will follow the order in the house rules, beginning with the chair and ranking member, then in order of seniority. the rules require me to inform you we have set up an email address where members can submit anything they wish to submit in writing. that has been provided in advance to your staff.

before i give my remarks, i would like to welcome the ranking member for his very first hearing with this subcommittee. we have gained a few new members to our subcommittee this congress. i would like to welcome them as well as our returning members. i will keep my opening statement brief so we can get right to questions. we welcome benjamin hovland, chairman of the election assistance commission, to testify on its work to ensure our elections are fair, secure and accessible. thank you for being here today. it is well-known that are foreign adversaries have made

attempts, and even have breached our election system to varying degrees in 2016, 2018 and 2020 elections. officials at all levels of government have worked to address vulnerabilities in our election system. as a result, the 2020 election was declared "the most secure in american history" by the previous administration's department of homeland security. the fact those officials were able to achieve this feat amid a pandemic is even more remarkable. now is not the time to proclaim mission accomplished. even though the election was secure, we know there was malicious activity from foreign adversaries leading to election day. the threats to our democracy are constant and ever evolving. our enemies will not be taking a break, so neither can we. this committee has helped lead congress's efforts to address this issue.

since 2018 we have provided 805 million dollars in grants to states to improve election security. we provided $400 million last year to help states prepare for the elections during the pandemic. as we know, eac administrators request funding for states. i hope you can help us better understand what states need and how they are spending the money. we have made significant investments in these grants. it seems the sporadic nature of these funds has hampered the ability of states to spend more quickly. i am curious to know your thoughts on how consistent funding could improve the rate at which states spend. and other ideas you might have incentivized states to get money out faster. -- and help americans participate in the voting process, we must ensure the agency has sufficient funds to do so. after their funding was slashed

nearly in half, eac received a significant infusion of funds in fy20. fy 21 continued that upward trend. as they -- the u.s. continues to face threats to elections, we must ensure eac has resources to provide support to states and the public. i look forward to hearing on the election grants and what additional resources you need. before i return to our witness for his statement, i would like to recognize our ranking member for his opening remarks. do i need to unmute you, sir? is he telling you anything? what is he saying?

anything? >> hello. >> hello. >> can you hear me? >> we can. >> good. i apologize. it may have been my ear pods denying my audio from going through. i noticed the chairwoman talked about rain in connecticut this morning. northwest arkansas is winning

the prize today. if i heard correctly, the previous overnight low in northwest arkansas was about four degrees. that was the previous record. this morning, right before 6:00, when i went to breakfast, our temperature this morning in rogers, arkansas was -15. 15 below zero. >> that's chicago cold. >> that's pretty chicago. that's correct. which explains a lot about chicago. but nonetheless, we got four to six inches of snow over the last couple of days. we will get hit again tonight with another three or four inches of snow before we get into a warming trend. but it is great to be with you. chairman, thank you for your kind words. a big hello to our witness, who happens to hail from my district. he is a eureka springs, arkansas native, went to college in

arkansas, and we are delighted to have him. it is great to be the ranking member on financial services in general government. this committee is charged with funding programs that impacts nearly every american, with a range of jurisdiction over sanctions, enforcement, the white house, courts and more. i look forward to looking with the chair and the members of the subcommittee. despite our political differences, the committee was able to fulfill our article one duty, approving covid relief. that spirit of unity and consensus should be continued as we work to advance appropriations bills in the coming months.

as we turn to today's hearing, i know each of us recognizes the importance of securing our elections. it is fundamental. we are blessed to have been effective and reliable system in arkansas. the commission has an important job assisting officials by administering grants to states, developing best practices, and acting as a clearinghouse of information. we are grateful for that. the pandemic challenged state and local election officials across the country as they worked to modify their processes to ensure voters could exercise their rights in a safe environment. they also maintain focus on cyber security vulnerabilities, voter registration systems, voting machines, and systems that tabulate and display results. i am pleased the commission has worked closely with dhs's

cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency and cyber command to make sure state and local officials understand better the threats they face and how to mitigate them. i hope these partnerships between the federal government and election officials continues to grow. i do not want to see the heavy hand of washington bureaucrats dictate to local officials how their elections must be administered or what equipment to used. keeping the administration of elections in control of the states is part of the bedrock system that has served america since its founding. i also believe states should be responsible for funding the costs of voting machines and election execution. not only does it incentivize effective management and decision-making, but with our national debt in excess of $20 trillion, it recognizes the harsh physical trajectory faced by unbridled spending. we need to be targeted, and direct federal tax dollars to the areas of greatest need. i think the chairman for holding this here men. i look forward to hearing our witness, and yield back that

balance of my time. >> we are joined by the chairwoman of the appropriations committee. there she is. >> good morning, good morning, good morning. >> good morning, good morning. >> wonderful to be with you. i thank you and i have the honor of being the chair of the full appropriations committee and will try to make as many of the hearings as i can, but it is a pleasure to join with you today and i want to recognize chairman mike quigley, ranking member steve womack, for organizing the hearing and i think the elections assistance commissioner, mr. hovland, who will testify this morning. i think the subject of today's

hearing is so critical and that we need to look at the steps we have taken to secure our democratic system and i know that is what we are going to hear about this morning. almost 400 years ago, our democracy was founded on the premise that all people are created equal. the right to vote would grow with each generation to ensure that democracy. and today, we have seen that challenged in some respects. for four years now, our right to vote has been threatened by foreign adversaries, and, this year, by challenges we had at the state level, and this hearing is an opportunity to discuss eac's resurgence after years of the agency being underfunded by previous congresses. i look forward to hearing more about the plans to continue to expand the eea see's ability to support state efforts to enhance election security, increase access to the polls, and improve the administration of federal

elections. it was not long ago that we had these conversations. the help america vote act of 2002 made broader reforms to the election system and established the eac to quell vulnerabilities. between 2010 and 2019, the eac's annual funding was cut. this inconsistent funding has hindered the ability of the agency and officials to combat real threats to election security. the rise of disinformation and the coronavirus pandemic have only further complicated these efforts. i want to say thank you to chairman quiqley for the first significant allocation of funds to the eac for it to be able to increase staffing, expand support to officials in 2020, again in 2021. the chairman, the ranking member, further increasing the funding to $17 billion. the increases have enabled the

eac to begin to rebuild the staff, which is already doubled in the past year, and expanded the agency's support of state election officials. and that is just the start. there is still considerable room for improvement as many states lack the funds to implement necessary election security measures, but no voter should ever have to choose between their health and their right to vote. one of our core responsibilities on this committee is to ensure that the agencies under our purview safeguard america's election processes and our democracy, and the eac is a national clearinghouse for information on election administration and accessibility and the only federal agency completely dedicated to election administration. so, now more than ever, we need to provide the necessary resources, support the protection of our democracy,

secure our elections. i want to say again, thank you for your work and i look forward to hearing testimony on this important subject. thank you and i yield back, mr. chair. rep. quigley: thank you. we appreciate you being here. we look forward to your leadership. our future guest today, the chairman of the election assistance commission, benjamin hovland. thank you for being here. please go forward with your opening statement. mr. hovland: thank you, chairman.

i'm the head of the eac. i appreciate the opportunity to testify on the impact of the grants. the story of election administration in 2020 cannot be told without acknowledging the tremendous job state and local election officials did to run their elections while facing unprecedented challenges. with a record of nearly 160 million americans voting in the november general election in the middle of a global pandemic, the effort required to conduct this election was herculean, and the officials who managed this task deserve our thanks and praise. while politics in the aftermath of the election have distracted

many from how it was run, i can unequivocally say this is the best administered election i have seen in my career, for many reasons. first and foremost, the officials that run elections put their personal health on the line and worked countless hours for their voters and our democracy. federal grant money also played an essential role in assisting election officials with challenges. since 2018, congress has appropriated $805 million per election security. this has helped replace outdated voting machines, databases, created innovative new programs, and addressed head on some of the resource disparity challenges of our decentralized election system, and provided for countless hours of training for staff to be on alert and prepare and respond to common attack sectors. the funding gives me complete confidence.

the november 3 election was the most secure in our nation's history. additionally, the $400 million provided as part of the cares act enabled 2020 elections officials address some of the additional costs associated with funding the largest mail and absentee ballot surge ever experienced and making polling places as safe as possible. eac is proud of the work we did to administer these grants and appreciate this committee's trust in us to do the job. the recent funding increase also increased our capacity to assist election officials during this challenging time. from an all-time low operating budget of $7.95 million in fy

19, the increase in fy 20 made for an exciting time. we expanded the work force by hiring experts in important efforts, including numerous mission-critical positions across departments. throughout the any 20 primaries and general election, the eac provided much-needed assistance to officials. we were able to leverage partnerships with state, local and federal partners to quickly respond to the challenges presented by the pandemic. we developed new guidance, post public forums on pandemic concerns, and monitored state preparations, encouraging election officials to share their successes and challenges. these included videos, materials for election officials highlighting best practices, addressing concerns related to covid and the use of cares act funding. other new efforts included creating the eac's new cyber access and security program,

which provided security training, best practices and other assistance for protecting critical election infrastructure. the agency also established the first national poll worker recruitment day, galvanizing recruitment efforts and alleviating concerns about a significant shortage in poll workers due to the pandemic. while we acknowledge the success of officials to administer the election, it is also clear there is much work to be done. if the 2020 election has taught us anything, it is that our democracy is precious. we must invest in it to make it stronger and constantly seek to improve that. as the plan notes, governmentwide approach to funding elections and election security is needed, including the subsectors and infrastructure of our democracy. it is important to understand the need to ensure this system is strong. we appreciate the interest in the agency's efforts.

eac has helped assist officials through this time, but the job requires the proper level of investment to ensure success. eac is prepared to play an increased role in this pursuit and look forward to our continued partnership with the subcommittee and congress. thank you. i'm happy to answer any questions. >> thank you. we are starting to have these hearings in rapid succession, so some embers have conflicts. i am going to let mr. bishop go first just because he is wanted in another meeting shortly. i will recognize mr. bishop. rep. bishop: thank you. thank you very much, mr. chairman, and thank you chairman hovland for your testimony and all the work that the eac has done over the past year.

i will try to be brief if i can. i want to talk about the mail-in voting. the ongoing coronavirus pandemic has presented million challenges in administering elections. about 100 million americans voted early this past election. you mention the cares act added $400 million in funding. how this funding was used to improve states mail-in voting procedures. tell us how the eac supported in person voting. another subject that is near and another subject that is very near and dear to me, i had a conversation and a meeting just

yesterday with the national federation. they raised some concerns about accessibility for voters with disabilities. they particularly were concerned with legislation that could ensure that americans with disabilities have the same opportunity to vote as independently as other voters, and they indicated that, with the absentee and mail-in votes, sometimes it has been difficult for them to access that, because, obviously, it is not in braille, and they would like for the eac and for congress to look at some ways to ensure they could be communicated with actively, accurately and effectively and they can respond, because they find the current processes of our absentee/mail-in ballots to be somewhat onerous for them. thank you very much.

if you could handle that. i will yield back. mr. hovland: thank you, congressman bishop. as mentioned, the cares act was a big deal for states and localities to get this money during the pandemic. as i mentioned in my testimony, most jurisdictions were facing the largest mail in/absentee ballot election they have ever had. that does not mean people are not used to having mail-in and absentee ballots. we know from an election administration and voting survey that about 25% of americans voted that way in 2016. this year, it will be closer to 50%. some of the things -- the importance of getting that money out early was it allowed people to make equipment upgrades, possibly some things to manually were automated. they handled that volume inquiries. we worked -- i mentioned the covid-19 joint working group.

that worked with election officials in the private sector to identify best practices. one of the benefits of decentralized elections was you had election officials from washington and oregon and utah and colorado who had been implementing vote by mail and expanded absentee balloting for decades and were able to share some of those lessons learned with their colleagues that did not have that luxury of time to ramp that up, and so that made a humongous difference in those preparations. at eac, we did videos to show people, produced various guides, but a lot of it also was getting that money early to take into account some of those timelines.

you also mentioned the in person, making that as safe as possible. the joint working group addressed a lot of those issues. we also worked with the cdc to issue guidance on how to make polling places as safe as possible for voters and poll workers. you saw a lot of innovation to reduce contact, regular contact surfaces. the i voted pen made an appearance this year instead of the sticker. your question about accessibility. absolutely agree with that. the help americans vote act created the eac. it was, in many ways, accessibility legislation making sure americans could vote independently and privately. we work to share best practices around that. i think there is more we can do to make mail and absentee ballots accessible to more americans. different states have implemented this in different ways. the move act requires each state to have a portal for ballot delivery for military and

overseas voters. i think we can do a lot to either build a template or encourage those to become -- make sure those are secure and accessible so they can be used for the military and overseas voters, but also, it is a great way to deliver blank ballots for accessibility purposes as well. rep. bishop: thank you. rep. quigley: i recognize the raking member, mr. womack. rep. womack: thank you. thank you to our witness. just a couple of questions related to federal spending on elections. the cares act -- if my numbers are correct, the cares act had $400 million allocated to states for the 2020 election cycle related to covid. the speaker's heroes act, which

was not enacted but passed in the house twice, would have provided an additional $3.6 billion for this purpose. based on initial data reported by the states, it is my understanding that states only used about $270 million, or 68% of the $400 million provided in the cares package, so it begs this question, mr. chairman. was the 400 million provided in cares more than what the states needed? if, in fact, only 68% of what was provided was actually used. mr. hovland: thank you, ranking member womack. you are right on those numbers. $270 million that we had, that was preliminary based on a

report that the cares act required. we will have a more complete picture on february 28. when you look at that number again, the low number, the low bar will be about 70% being used. which was important. there were some issues as you know -- there was a 20% match requirement that required state legislative approval to use the money. that led to delays or challenges. this went out the door toward the end of state legislative cycles, or some had ended, so there were some issues with that as far as getting funding at the door. what the number was exactly -- this was probably the most expensive election we have ever seen. you did see some private philanthropy come in that i do not recollect ever seeing. mark zuckerberg and others since -- spent about about $400

million. i talked to people who distributed that, to officials who received it, and that would go to the basics, ppe, to disinfect, clean, and procure significantly -- enough polling locations, places that have closed down because maybe they were senior centers that were not available. also enough places to have social distant for voters and staff. so it really is, you know, getting the right number is tricky. i am happy to dive down into some of the consistent issues that the chairman mentioned, but i think that is really what you look at as far as the cares act money went this year. rep. womack: so we go back to the heroes package i referenced a minute ago. based on some arkansas math here, it was an amount nine times greater than the $400 million in the cares package.

let's assume the heroes act was enacted. what would states be spending $3.6 billion on? mr. hovland: i am a proud graduate of eureka springs, so i am good at arkansas math. go highlanders. again, anytime you look at federal election funding, the expiration dates matter, the structure matters. when you look at -- we can talk about this more with some of the security grants, but the way the grants are structured mostly is the go to the states. states and localities have different expenses and needs in the elections space. the bulk of expenses within election administration is borne

out at the local level in most states. that's important. one of the things i have seen in some of the house appropriations bills has been a piece that mentions 50% in cash or in-kind going to the local. i think that is very important. unfortunately, it has not made it through the senate side, but that really recognizes the costs that are primarily borne out at the local level, but also allows for that flexibility both in top-down and bottom-up states in the way the structure elections. rep. womack: one of my concerns as an appropriate or, and this has been the case for the 10 years i have served in congress, is invariably states and even further down on the local level, state, county level, they'll want more money. they all want money.

i think it is incumbent on them to demand. i will not discount the fact that we should have a role in helping people through technical assistance and what have you on elections, but it goes without saying that the more we give, and in this particular case, because of a covid situation, it was more of a one-off than normal. the more we give, the more we become reliant on those kinds of funding packages, which lessens the need in their opinion to cough up the money locally. i have always believed, i am a former mayor, if the money is gifted to us by another agency some time, it can be used a little more loosely, so i just want us to understand.

i want all my colleagues on this committee to understand that we have got significant debt and we have to be careful not to allow more and more of federal tax dollars to go what is supposed to be paid for at the local level. i have more to say about that. i will reserve that for another time, but i appreciate the opportunity to engage in conversation. thank you i will yield back. , rep. quigley: thank you. we recognize the chairwoman. >> i do not. i am just interested in listening to the questions of our colleagues. on both sides of the aisle. thank you for this important hearing. i will continue to be present, but i do not want to detract from what our colleagues on the subcommittee want to get at, so thank you. i yield back. thank you.

rep. quigley: thank you. chairman, let me ask a few questions here. we talk about the money not being used. certainly, the timing of that, you referenced issues. there is a matching issue that comes at the end. some general assemblies do not meet very often. but do you also glean or hear from them that some of the issues, other issues, why this isn't happening, is it because they went so long without it that they are hoarding it so they can level off the spending over a period of time, recognizing next year they may get zero dollars from the federal government, or other reasons?

mr. hovland: thank you, chairman. i will distinguish between the cares act funding and other grant money, because i think they are a little bit different, but on the security grants in particular that's right. for a long time, we went without any type of additional funding until 2018. certainly, that -- you know, i know a lot of states wonder, is this the end of federal money? i think a bigger part of it is, frankly, some of the timelines that we are on. again, we have seen a lot of the fye money being spent, but you also have the fy20 money. at the end of 2019, off the iowa caucuses and into the presidential cycle, it is difficult to do in an election year, but you also do not want be making major equipment changes in the middle of a presidential election because of unintended consequences or possibly bugs with those systems.

there are states -- i will give you two examples. delaware [indiscernible] using the fy18 money. delaware got $3 million, the minimum, in fy18, and used all of that to assist in the purchase of equipment. delaware has three counties. you look at the louisiana, they are in the process of procuring a new statewide system. the projections look at that as being about a $95 million to $100 million purchase to cover their parishes. the federal portion from all the security money, the 18 and 20 adds up to about $12.5 million, so a significant portion, but they are still looking to get a significant state and local investment, and, as soon as that procurement goes through, that contract goes through, they will have spent down to zero.

and so you have these buckets. arkansas sent grants to a lot of their counties and that was spent on new equipment. arkansas used all of its money. a different category, illinois. a few integrative -- innovative programs called cyber navigators, where you recognize that some counties do not have been need or resources of a dedicated cyber professional, so you have three employees with regional responsibilities. they have a handful of counties they are responsible for. that is a program designed to last over time and respond to the consistent nature of the cyber security challenges, so the spend down rate on that is low. the other category i mentioned earlier, what louisiana did where they are on the verge of a major procurement, another example that i heard from an election director recently, they

expect to use all their money to replace their statewide voter registration database, but that is not something they wanted to do in the middle of an election cycle. rep. quigley: do you have information on how each state spends its money? mr. hovland: we get reports on that on the fiscal year. we have reporting through september 30 of 2020. and they have until the end of the year to provide that, so we are still working with a couple states to make sure their numbers are right and we have that accurately, then we will provide a report. again, the whole picture, you can see the money is significant, though it isn't enough to cover some of the major purchases like total equipment replacements, voting machine replacements, so states

-- jurisdictions are going through and prioritizing. maybe it is equipment, maybe it is implementing audits, cybersecurity training, programs, but, again, a lot of that is making choices and priorities about each state's individual risk. rep. quigley: thank you. you are recognized. >> while we are playing with the camera, i am enjoying the education. i yield back. rep. quigley: thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i am looking forward to being on this committee. appreciate it. chairman hovland, thank you for

being here. i have a question around the last election, but moving forward from it, on voter misinformation. there was a quinnipiac poll found 30% of voters -- 30 -- 37% of voters who think there was widespread fraud in the election, and we saw what that manifested on january 6. a three-part question. what is the role of the agency in combating misinformation? are there proactive steps we are taking between now and the 2022 midterms to give americans confidence in our election system? three, do you have resources to help towards that end for 2022 and 2024? mr. hovland: thank you for that. absolutely. great question. very important. as i mentioned earlier, i think

there are a lot of benefits we get through our decentralized election system. the assistance funds to vote by mail states on how to ramp up was one. one challenge we have to recognize is that a decentralized system makes us more susceptible to misinformation and disinformation. it is harder to combat because each state does elections a little differently. but i look at what we need to do on that, the national association of secretaries of state state drove info 2020, trying to get their information from state and local election officials. that was important. i think we can do more. we get a lot of calls, a lot of fact checking at the eac, our election administration and voting survey. i think with the resources,

adequate resources, i would love to see us establish a one-stop shop website that helps with voter education, fact checking, has that information directly from the states about the various ways that, you know, when is your registration deadline? when do you have to request a mail-in ballot? those rules of the road. i think our effort to create national poll worker recruitment day, where we had the help america vote website, showed you could have national campaigns that pointed people to one central location like helpamericanvote.gov. that website gave people basic information and got them to their state and local election officials. i think there is a model with how we can do that with broader education and educate the public

around the process, can get them the accurate information to their state, to their jurisdiction but that will take more resources. >> thank you. just a question as far as, in your opinion, are we capable of anticipating threats? are our states capable of doing that, or do we need to provide infrastructure help for states? mr. hovland: we have done a good job of information sharing. a part of why i was comfortable making that statement about the 2020 election is that we have seen this seachange of information sharing. there has been the creation of an election infrastructure information sharing and analysis -- that has got almost 3000 members. you really have a level of visibility and communication in the election space we have never

had before. that said, chairman quigley hit on it earlier, the funding stream. that is one piece of this. the nature of threats, the ongoing nature of those threats and the fact that it is a national security issue means there is real value to having, you know, a piece of federal funding that is known, that is dependable, that can be planned around so it is efficient. also, there is a federal portion of the ballot. this is a national security issue. here is the federal piece. state and locals are primarily responsible for funding elections, you come up with the rest. that is what the sector's plan envisions and its funding section when it talks about the whole of government approach to funding elections. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i yield back.

rep. quigley: thank you. >> to who? >> hello, everyone. i would like to thank our electors across the country. i have a question for you, mr. hovland. in october, two right wing individuals were charged in connection to racist robo calls attempting to dissuade and discourage 12,000 black people in detroit and other cities from voting in november, telling them that voting by mail would subject them to arrest, debt collection, and a forced vaccine. what do we need to do to fight

this and fight disinformation campaigns from our citizens, particularly in underserved communities and the black and brown communities? what public engagement campaigns is the eac employing to combat this misinformation? we know that election security and what we struggle with the most in this last election was misinformation. thank you. mr. hovland: thank you, representative lawrence. great question. that is absolutely one of the biggest challenges. i think there were a lot of things that you hit on that are important to dive into. one, you know, we see more and more misinformation and disinformation, you know, both domestic, but also amplified by

foreign adversaries that often mirrors traditional voter suppression tactics. that is a real concern. if it is domestic, that should be enforced by the doj or local prosecutors, but to your main point, i think we can do more around the voter education. i mentioned the one-stop shop website. i think that's a big deal, getting that trusted source information to voters, having one place you can point people to. another thing i did not mention earlier is we are in and interagency agreement with gsa on vote.gov around voter registration. i think that is something that can be expanded on. i think you could have basic voter education videos there to help reduce barriers to entry. we know from various studies that a lot of people are not comfortable participating because they are not familiar with the process. they do not want to go to the polling place and not understand

what is happening or maybe they do not know how balloting works. even at the national level, i think we can do basic voter education videos to reduce people's potential for being intimidated with things like you described. i think there is a lot of work we can do there to address voter education. and on a lot of these things, you know, when you think about the fiscal impact, i recognize with the ranking member said, but when we can find those areas where you have a 50 state impact or close to it, the federal government can save taxpayer dollars around the country because you are not reinventing the wheel. you get that economy of scale of the national approach and the ability to utilize other organizations to amplify those messages at the national scale , we have had a lot of success

with national poll worker recruitment day getting amplified on a number of different places by celebrities, by various groups, and you saw a new generation of poll workers step up. so in many ways, i think that is [indiscernible] for voter education. rep. lawrence: if i may, you hit upon a couple of those things. partnering with the secretary of state so automatic address misinformation. a website is good. these are robo calls coming into homes. just to be committed financially to your budget and a commitment that you can make because he misinformation, if we do not attack that and change that, we are never going to get our election process to be sustainable, and we fought through at this time and i am so

proud of all the engagement. you named some of the private entities that you are working with, and i just want to be on the record that the targeted groups are usually those who are minority groups and underserved, and there is a benefit to not having them turn out. thank you so much and i yield back. rep. quigley: thank you. i apologize if i went out of order. i did not realize another memory -- member has joined us. he is now recognized. >> i have been on the whole time. sometimes some of us may not have our cameras on. no worries at all. two things. thank you for being with us. mr. quickly and the ranking member, thank you for hosting.

solar winds is a catastrophe in the cyber world. i need to understand, did we have any evidence that any of our processes in elections were violated or compromised at all by solar winds? especially knowing that it has been out there for a long time. second question, you mentioned mr. chairman mr. zuckerberg's -- , he said $400 million. it was actually about $429 he contributed to nonprofit organizations private , organizations, state elections being one of them. my concern is, at my question is, do you know how that money was spent? and was it spent evenly? if we have private individuals or companies spending hundreds of millions of dollars, in some places may be more than the federal government is spending, let's say they target blue leaning districts or blue leaning states, or perhaps another group comes in and targets red districts or states.

i think that would be problematic. that would be very obvious to both of us. talk to us about that, this funding of these private groups, our ability to know how that money is being spent, and is that influencing the outcome? or could it potentially influence the outcome if it is spent in one district or another? mr. hovland: thank you for the question. on the solar wind, i have not seen any evidence that the election or tallies were impacted. some of the things that were in place this year that were crucially important to that were you had about 95% of americans vote on a paper ballot or audit trail. obviously in a number of close , states, we saw audits and recounts, a hand inspection in georgia that reconfirmed machine tallies, all very important.

solar winds is a reminder of the evolving nature of these challenges, and basically that we can't, you know, i think election officials did an amazing job this year. there has been a seachange in information sharing at the federal level, but it is a great reminder that the work has to continue the investment has to , continue. that is the nature of these threats and challenges. as far as the private philanthropy money money to cover the covid expenses, i have had briefings on that. it was available to jurisdictions all over the country. it went to counties run by democrats, republicans, independents. it was available to everyone. >> do you know how that money was spent, though? can you say that x amount was spent in these states? x amount was spent in another? mr. hovland: i do not have the breakdown because that was not money we distributed. i think it is important that

that money came in given the pandemic, but on balance i think it is a failure of government on balance that states and jurisdictions had to rely on the philanthropy of billionaires to buy some of the bases, some of the ppe expenses they had to protect staff as they put their health on the line. again, i am glad it was there for the jurisdictions that needed it this year, but i hope we can remedy that in the future so we do not have to rely on private philanthropy in this space. >> well, i agree, and i think we should. i am asking you if you could try to find the information for us. could you do that? mr. hovland: i would be happy to look into that and reach out with more information. >> if you can find out, that's a -- if we can't find out that information, that's a problem. we should be able to know. if somebody is contributing in ways that is election oriented, we should know how and where

that money is spent. the second thing is, to your point, chairman, this is primarily to preclude or to help with some of the expenses of covid, but i worry that this sets a precedent that will continue into the future. in four years, hopefully we are not dealing with covid. now, though, do we think we have set a precedent where we have private individuals who come in with hundreds of millions of dollars and are targeting specific states? that would be a real problem. it would be a real problem for either side. and i think we need -- if that is a problem or could be -- the first way to deal with that is to know where that money is spent. again, i would appreciate if you could get back with that. rep. quigley: thank you. >> i'm sorry mr. chairman did

you say me? rep. quigley: yes. >> first of all, the commission chairman, thank you for being with us today. i must stress that there is a great need for you to work together with other federal agencies, other secretaries, to ensure that everyone is working towards the same goal when it comes to election security, when it comes to delivery of ballots. with that in mind, i have three issues i would like to address with you. the postal service. the postal service was severely handicapped, reduced, attacked, whatever word you may wish to use to describe what happened in those last two months.

it caused a lot of delays of mail-in ballots due to the pandemic. state deadlines did not align with the reality of the mail system that was set up. it was a set up for voters to fail to deliver their outlets -- now it's -- ballots on time. so what role will bac play moving forward to ensure that voting deadlines align with the reality of the usps? and what steps can congress take to ensure the usps guarantees on-time delivery of all domestic mail-in ballots sent before the saturday before election day? on that same note, surrounding postal delays in the last election, it is imperative that voters have alternative ways of

returning mail-in ballots. such as drop boxes. however, we must ensure that drop-off boxes are in place in locations that are secure. and that we establish minimum guidelines. in my home state of california, the gop placed more than 50 drop-off boxes in los angeles, fresno and orange counties which were fraudulent. the other issue was already mentioned by a previous colleague as it relates to people with disabilities. there are 7 million eligible voters who live with visual impairment. all of these voters have the legal right to vote under the americans with disabilities act. so what are you looking to do to

help ensure that ballots, someday, are available in braille? to ensure we have a voting system that is truly a personal vote and doesn't have to be disclosed simply because someone needs assistance. mr. hovland: thank you for those questions. on the usps issue, we were -- we work fairly closely with usps. specifically on the state deadlines, that was not new, there has been more focused on it this year. that is certainly something that state lawmakers balance. on one hand, you want to make absentee ballots available to people who may not have another option. but if you allow for example, some states allow for a request three days before the election,

well it is not realistic it will , make it both ways in transit. you also have different states that have either a postmark or postal indicator deadlines or received by election day deadlines. those make a difference. we will continue to work on best practices. rep. torres: i wanted to ask -- interrupt to because we cannot abandon our responsibility to ensure that a federal election happens. and voters are not disenfranchised. so that is your task. i hope you will come back to our committee and provide some input on what we can do to ensure there are minimum requirements for states to meet these guidelines. mr. hovland: a quick thing that he would make a huge difference, a few years ago, the federal voting assistance program did a pilot program with the usps on full end-to-end tracking for

ballots for overseas citizens. my understanding is that you can in turn go go full domestic tracking for about $8 million for the post office. not only would that help election officials understand where ballots are, see problems that can be identified immediately. but it would also get voters get the confidence they can the in-transit both ways. a lot of states have done that. we saw a big improvement this year. i think if you had a uniform system implemented by the usps, people could build out off of that baseline because it would be uniform across the country. i think that is an immediate improvement that can happen. rep. quigley: thank you, miss kirkpatrick is recognized.

>> thank you, chairman. as you know, in arizona, over 90% of our vote is vote by mail. which is a good thing. we have seen an improvement in voter participation because of that. but, we have tribal areas and rural areas that don't have everything they need for the service. my question is, what are you doing to address the rural areas, especially tribal areas, where they don't have daily mail service? mr. hovland: thank you for that. a hugely important issue. you are right, arizona's permanent early voting list has led to significant expansion of absentee balloting and mail. there are challenges to usps delivery. that is something we are aware

of, we continue to highlight practices. one of the things that is a hugely important issue, and one of the things that is important to recognize is the nature of the eac, we are a small agency. it was mentioned we had an all-time low operating budget of $7.9 million. this year, we have a $15.5 million operating budget. that means we are almost -- we are a little below where we were with inflation a decade ago. you look at a sister agency like the federal election commission, they are at $70 million. you look at the election program, $40 million as part of a $1.5 billion sub agency. so if you look at our 50 state

jurisdiction and the breath of the count that challenges -- being an election administrator has never been harder than it is right now. elections are chronically under resourced across the country. at the state and local level and also the federal level. i would not hesitate to say we should be a1 hundred million dollar agency -- $100 million agency to take on the challenges people expect of us. i know that does not happen overnight but i think this is a great example of one of the issues that needs to be tackled. when we look at the statutory mandates, the things that we are required to do under the help america vote act, this is important and we want to work on best practices. but there is also a reality with the resources congress has given us. rep. kirkpatrick: my follow-up question has to do with violence at polling places. this was an emotional election, we had marches in arizona, we

had people angry -- angry crowds marching to the polls. i just wonder two things, are you seeing that have a chilling effect on volunteers who work the polls? and a chilling effect on the turnout? mr. hovland: what we saw more of this year, certainly arizona was a hotspot in many ways. i think we saw more of that in the aftermath, a number of election officials receiving death threats. totally unacceptable. these are public servants that but there personal health on the line in service of our democracy. people who care more about the integrity of our elections than anyone else. so, really, unacceptable. really unfortunate. i hope it does not deter people. i do think it was an extremely

stressful year and there is a level of burnout amongst election officials. but it is one more reason we need to recognize what they do , provide sufficient resources. again, the job has never been harder. that is both the administration peace, but the challenges you are alluding to as far as around voter education to the process. more people saw more of the process this year than probably ever before. most people tune in on election night, see the preliminary results and tune out. this year, we saw the audits. we saw people going through provisional ballots. we saw the canvas and the certification process. i think that was important. but we can clearly do more to educate people around that and we can do more to support election officials around the country. rep. kirkpatrick: thank you very much, mr. chairman. i yield back.

rep. quigley: quick question, chairman. is there anything you would suggest to incentivize states to move the money out quicker? mr. hovland: i think, a few things. on the security grant money , there is a lot that ties into the timeline i mentioned. i think that with a consistent annual funding stream coming, it would allow them to plan for that accordingly. you can look at the 18 20 money doesn't have appropriations. that was the first real money to come in a long time. i don't other people have confidence there will be more. but then you saw at the same time, the expiration cares act money was a little too short. we are happy, our finance team is a great job working with the states. we are happy to work with your

staff and work on some of the details that should involve talking to state and local election officials, and recognizing part of the difference i've mentioned before in costs at the state and local level. i think there is a lot we can do and i am happy to work on that with you. >> do you have a follow-up question? >> we don't have as much time but i want folks who had something to finish up the opportunity. >> i do. mr. chairman, thank you. i appreciate the information you are giving today. this is a question about misuse of funding. how are you organized, set up,

this comes back to our oversight piece, how are we able to discern the misuse of funds if and when it happens? and, what actions are taken, what prompts and ig report that would have the ability to recover the misuse of funds? if you could talk about that particular subject. mr. hovland: i am happy to. when i mentioned our budget earlier, one piece that is important is that we spend about a million dollars a year on the inspector general. for an agency our size, that is a huge portion of our budget. even when our budget was at $8 million, one million of that was going to the inspector general. that is because the inspector general's office audits all of the money. usually, it is about five or six

dates a year. sometimes a little bit more. this year, actually arkansas, florida, kentucky, massachusetts, new mexico, west virginia were all audited. we are looking back at that money, looking at how it is spent, looking at receipts, making sure that it falls in categories that are allowed by congress, qualifying expenses. then we provide those reports to you. we will continue to do that across the country, and we are looking at cares money, we are looking at security money. a big part of our role is both helping states and jurisdictions on the front end. providing information, resources, webinars on allowed expenses, ways people can use the money. and then on the backend,

auditing that in making sure that it has been used correctly. rep. womack: my final question would be in education, we have accreditation standards and accreditation facilities set up to be able to monitor and judge just how effective these education institutions are. is there an accreditation standard and an accreditation , platform by which our states are judged as to how they carry out their missions on elections? mr. hovland: with our decentralized elections, there is certainly no federal standard, we have a decentralized system. the eac is largely not regulatory. you see things that are created like the elections performance indexed, housed out of the m.i.t. elections lab that was created by a general trust. there are a number of different

ways you can look at it. i think a little different then a ranking standard, but to your question earlier, on resourcing and how we get there, one of the great things about the election assistance commission is when congress created the help america vote act was the federal clearinghouse responsibility. there is so much more we can do with that. one of the big things i would like to see us expand into more of is training. because sharing those best practices that election officials discover across the country, doing trainings around that. deficiencies we can realize, tax dollars we can save through that, those are significant. i think that is a critical mission for the agency in the future.

[indiscernible] >> is there a follow-up? >> i do not, mr. chairman. i will put a letter together. rep. quigley: very good, thank you. ms. kirkpatrick? can you get a little closer to your microphone? ms. kirkpatrick: is this better? yeah, my question is what are your concerns about violence at the polling places? you know, i am [static] -- [indiscernible]

my question has to do with poll markers and turn up -- turn out every election. again, threats of violence, the chilling effects on that being able to recruit volunteers. mr. hovland: one of the real silver linings i saw in this year's election, in the primaries we saw a lot of help around poll workers. we know from the election administrators and voting surveys that the majority of poll workers are over age 60. we know that recruiting is always challenging. in 2018, about 70% of jurisdictions had some difficulty finding poll workers. in the primaries, you saw

particularly from the states that had primaries in the early days of the pandemic like wisconsin, had a huge dropout had shut down a lot of polling , places. it became clear that it was going to be critical to have enough poll workers. that is part of why we launched the national poll worker recruitment day. there are also other efforts, power the polls. you saw employers giving people the day off. but it really resulted in a new generation of americans stepping up and serving as poll workers. it's my hope -- i served as a poll worker a number of times. it is my hope that their experience was similar to mine, they realized they were the customer-service face of our democracy. what they were there to do did not have anything to do with who people were voting for but , simply that they were there. and your opportunity to make the process be a good one. to help that 18-year-old who was

a little bit nervous or the senior citizen that has been voting longer than you have been alive, give them a little extra assistance, give them the i've voted sticker, thank them for coming out. i know that was the experience i had as a poll worker and i am hopeful that the new generation have that same experience as well. poll worker recruitment has been a challenge for a long time. i think it is something we need to continue to amplify. i think we learned this year a lot of people did not know it was a way they can serve their community. i think we will continue to push those efforts but it is crucial. >> thank you so much, i yield back. rep. quigley: thank you. you did have a question the first come, do you have one for the second round? [no audio]

not sure if he is still with us. [no audio] i assume he is either no longer with us or it is a negative. so what we will do is wrap up in general. thank you for your service and work, your willingness to participate. mr. ranking member, did you have anything else you wanted to say in closing? >> not at all, good to have the chairman with us. and you see a product.

good to have him here next time , you're back in the third district of arkansas, make sure i get a call. let me know. mr. hovland: all right, that sounds good. rep. quigley: i want to thank all who helped put this together. although top -- all who participated, the staff was outstanding. these are difficult times, we look forward to seeing you all in person as we do this next time and we will see you all soon. we are adjourned. thank you. announcer: coming up life today on the c-span networks, the house services committee looks at the defense department covid-19 response come at 11:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. on c-span 2 at 10:00 a.m., a house judiciary subcommittee holds a hearing slavery reparations commission. at 10:30 a.m., the monthly fcc meeting looks at the availability of broadband during the pandemic. coming