Top Democrats on the US congressional intelligence committees say they are preparing to check and respond to any claim by US President Donald Trump that foreign powers interfered in the November 3 midterm elections, even though they say they have seen no sign of any country interfering with voting or vote counting.

The concern comes as Democrats lead by eight points among likely voters in the fight for control of Congress, according to an October 27 PBS News/NPR/Marist poll. It also follows a prime-time address in July in which Trump singled out China, alleging that Beijing interfered in the 2020 election, a claim not substantiated by the evidence he released.

“We continue to see nothing to contradict the long-standing assessment by the [intelligence community] that no adversary has attempted to interfere with the physical infrastructure or vote counting of our elections,” Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement on October 27.

The statement said the committee had received its fifth pre-election briefing from senior intelligence officials, and gave no further details.

Himes and Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, previously also said the administration has not provided the statutorily required reports on foreign threats due 120, 60 and 30 days before the election.

The lawmakers also said they had asked Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton and CIA Director John Ratcliffe to be reachable by phone on Election Day so they can check any claims of foreign interference in real time, according to NPR and CBS News.

“We start with the premise that the president is going to do that,” Himes said at a briefing with reporters, according to NPR. “We’re making the assumption that the president is not going to accept the results of what looks to be a very challenging election for him and his party.”A spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told CBS News that Clayton had told both intelligence committees he was available “24/7 on any issue”. A CIA spokesman also said Ratcliffe would continue to be available to the agency’s oversight committees as appropriate.

Asked earlier this month whether he would accept the results, Trump said he would, but added: “We don’t want cheating.”Representative Rick Crawford, the House committee’s Republican chairman, did not respond to requests for comment on whether his party agrees with the Democrats’ assessment. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not respond to a request for comment on election interference.

A White House official told the South China Morning Post that, following task force findings on what the official described as China’s “illicit acquisition” of 220 million voter files and Chinese-made parts in voting machines.

The voter files Trump cited in July were not confidential, according to people familiar with the matter cited by news agencies at the time. Political consultants routinely buy such files. A 2021 US intelligence assessment concluded that China did not deploy efforts to change the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.

The official also cited an August 24 letter from Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to the White House Transparency Task Force.

It cited declassified records saying China remains “the most active and persistent cyber threat” to US networks, and an October 2024 intelligence memo saying China, Iran and Russia “have the technical capability to access some US election-related networks and systems”.

The letter also said the three largest voting machine vendors, which make up more than 80 per cent of the market, acknowledge Chinese-made parts. The letter did not allege that any machine had been tampered with.

The Trump administration has also stepped up efforts to address alleged voter fraud ahead of the midterm elections.

The Department of Homeland Security is requiring funded states to audit five per cent of paper ballots after the 2026 election. The process involves manually checking a random sample of ballots against machine-reported results to verify accuracy and identify potential errors or manipulation.

The US Justice Department sent letters to election officials in all 50 states on October 29, reminding them to preserve federal election records for 22 months and warning that violations could carry criminal penalties, including prison time and fines.

Omar Noureldin, senior vice-president of policy and litigation at Common Cause, a democracy and voting rights advocacy group, said influence, such as social media bots spreading disinformation, had been seen in past election cycles, while interference targeted the mechanics and technical infrastructure of elections.

“I want to be clear that there have been no credible reports of foreign interference,” Noureldin said about the 2026 midterm.

Although there are no signs of Chinese interference with voting or vote counting, lawmakers say Beijing is conducting influence operations in the US.

NPR reported that Himes and Warner said a classified intelligence briefing detailed Chinese influence operations targeting US elections. “China’s been more selective, oftentimes on local races or smaller issues, oftentimes with Chinese nationals involved,” Warner told NPR.

Neither lawmaker has said which races are targeted, what methods are being used or how this cycle compares with earlier ones. Their offices did not respond to the SCMP’s requests for detail by publication time.

In July, Trump cited declassified intelligence on China’s acquisition of American voter data. An SCMP analysis in July also found little evidence supporting Trump’s claims. It found documented Chinese interest in US voter data but no specific action to manipulate votes, divisions within the intelligence community over Beijing’s intentions, and questionable claims of an FBI cover-up.

Beijing rejected the allegations Trump made in July, as it has similar accusations over the years. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian called the claims fabricated, malicious and long proven groundless.

He said China respected the principle of non-interference and had never meddled in US domestic affairs, and urged Washington to examine its own conduct, including global surveillance and data theft.

Noureldin also accused the administration of cutting more than US$700 million from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s budget, weakening its ability to monitor such threats, and urged the next Congress to restore the funding.

He nevertheless expressed confidence in the resilience of US election systems against hacking, citing their decentralised structure.

“Our election administration system is a blessing and a curse,” he said. “It is decentralised across tens of thousands of election jurisdictions, which makes foreign interference in the infrastructure of our election administration system very, very difficult.”