Washington (CNN)When US intelligence and national security officials gathered at a classified facility in April to speak with election officials around the country, there was no burning new intelligence to share about threats to American democracy.
The briefing covered Russia's war on Ukraine and foreign and domestic sources of disinformation about US elections, according to three people familiar with the briefing.
But there was a striking change from pre-2020 briefings: It touched on violent threats to election officials that stem from conspiracy theories about the voting process.
Physical security concerns have "really ramped up since 2020 because of threats that we've seen to state and local officials across the country," said Kim Wyman, the top election security official at the federal US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which has encouraged election workers to report threats to law enforcement and is hiring more staff to advise election officials on physical threats.
Many of the thousands of local election officials in the US are living with a new reality as the midterm elections approach: They have spent countless hours rebutting false claims from former President Donald Trump and his supporters that the 2020 election was stolen while wondering about their personal safety and trying to prepare for future elections on a limited budget.
At the same time, local election officials have to keep an eye out for cyber threats that might exacerbate...
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