Hegseth Orders Pentagon Spies to Treat Midterm Defense as 'No-Fail Mission'

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered the Pentagon's intelligence and cyber forces to make protecting the 2026 midterms from foreign interference a "no-fail mission," according to a Fox News report published Monday, one day before Election Day.

The September directive tells the military to "mobilize every authorized asset, capability, and partnership" against foreign election threats. It is addressed to U.S. Cyber Command, the National Security Agency, and the directors of the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which means the whole Defense Intelligence Enterprise is on the hook.

Military intelligence is to collect and analyze foreign election threats, while Cyber Command is to use its existing authorities to counter foreign cyber activity in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security.

The order does not publicly grant new authorities or create a new election-security organization. The Pentagon declined to give Fox News further detail on implementation, and Cyber Command declined an interview request. Whether the order brought new personnel or resources has not been disclosed.

The military's role also stops at the border. State and local officials run elections, and the FBI and DHS handle the domestic side.

U.S. intelligence officials say they have seen no evidence that a foreign adversary has tried to interfere with voting machines, election infrastructure, or vote counting ahead of the midterms. Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said last week that nothing contradicts that assessment, though he urged Americans to stay on "high alert" for foreign disinformation as AI makes it easier to spread.

Officials are tracking influence efforts from Russia, China, and Iran. Lawmakers briefed on classified intelligence in October said Russia uses disinformation to target candidates and undermine confidence in the election, while China's efforts are narrower and focus on candidates seen as hostile to Beijing.

The Pentagon's election work has a long lineage. It took its current shape before the 2018 midterms with a "Russia Small Group," which became a joint Election Security Group. In 2022, then-NSA and Cyber Command chief Gen. Paul Nakasone called election security an "enduring, no-fail mission." It remains unclear whether that group was reconvened for 2026; in April, Gen. Joshua Rudd, who now leads both agencies, told lawmakers he was unsure.