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Trump declassifies election interference intel
President Trump said during a primetime address Thursday that he is declassifying and releasing documents that reportedly detail intelligence related to election system vulnerabilities and interference during the 2020 election.
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump announced during his primetime speech on Thursday that the White House would be releasing documents that will allegedly outline major vulnerabilities in the U.S. election system.
Trump claimed Chinese adversaries, as well as members of the "deep state" and U.S. intelligence agencies helped foster unfair elections, particularly during the 2020 elections.
Trump’s speech
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The president’s speech lasted about 24 minutes.
What they're saying:
"The documents we will release starting tonight have been gathered by the White House Government Transparency Task Force, a great group of people, along with the staff of the President's Intelligence Advisory Board, supported by our top intelligence agency chiefs, who have all personally reviewed the findings we are presenting this evening and fully confirmed their authenticity," Trump said during his speech.
Trump said the documents are available on a new page on the White House website.
"Go check it out," he said.
Trump alleged that Chinese hackers compromised 220 million U.S. voter files starting in 2020 and further claimed that electronic voting machines are highly vulnerable to hacking.
Trump also briefly mentioned the war in Iran and claimed that the "U.S. is "winning big in Iran, and you will see the fruits of that labor very, very shortly."
The president closed out his speech by urging the passage of the SAVE America Act.
The bill, known as the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, would require documentary proof of U.S. citizenship for anyone registering to vote — something voting rights group have warned could disenfranchise millions of Americans.
Noncitizen voting is illegal under federal law and already rare.
US President Donald Trump addresses the nation from the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC on July 16, 2026. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / POOL / AFP via Getty Images)
Some networks streamed the speech
At least some TV networks said Thursday they would not carry the speech live but would air it on their streaming services.
Both ABC and NBC decided not to air the remarks live but to carry them in full on their streaming services and break into network coverage as needed.
Primetime presidential addresses are typically reserved for major milestones or nationally significant events.
Trump last did it in April to speak on the Iran war, a month after it started. He said then that the U.S. would accomplish its objectives "very shortly" and that "the hard part is done, so it should be easy." The war, however, has dragged on and strikes between the U.S. and Iran have intensified this week.
Trump also delivered a politically charged primetime speech in December in which he sought to blame the challenging economic climate on Democrats.
The Source: Information for this article was taken from a speech given by President Donald Trump on July 16, 2026, reporting by FOX News and The Associated Press. Previous reporting by Reuters and Axios also contributed. This story was reported from San Jose.