Trump proposes cutting CISA election security program in FY27 budget
The proposal targets election security, workforce development, stakeholder engagement and a range of infrastructure protection efforts, marking one of the most significant overhauls of the nation’s civilian cyber defense agency since its creation.
The budget would notably eliminate CISA’s election security program entirely, including cutting funding for information-sharing support to state and local officials and removing dedicated election security advisors across the country.
The proposal would also end CISA’s support for the Elections Infrastructure Information Sharing and Analysis Center, or EI-ISAC, a key hub for sharing threat intelligence, cyber alerts and incident response resources with state and local election officials.
The moves would scale back one of the federal government’s main avenues for coordinating with state and local election officials on election cybersecurity risks like ransomware attacks, phishing campaigns and efforts by foreign adversaries to probe election systems and conduct influence operations.
The 2027 proposal would significantly scale back CISA’s stakeholder engagement operations, eliminating offices focused on stakeholder coordination and international affairs while shifting more responsibility for certain infrastructure security and emergency communications programs to state and local governments.
Any move to eliminate these stakeholder engagement functions could have far-reaching effects, as those offices serve as a main conduit between CISA and state, local, private-sector and international partners that play a role in protecting critical infrastructure in the U.S. and around the world.
The budget also calls for significant workforce reductions, including through cuts to funded but unfilled positions.
Collectively, the changes would eliminate roughly 867 positions across CISA, according to the budget justification, as more than 1,100 positions tied to program cuts would be partially offset by transfers into the agency and targeted hiring.
Also notable is the proposed elimination of CISA’s chemical security program, which would cut more than 200 positions tied to inspections and oversight of high-risk facilities. At the same time, roughly $300 million and hundreds of personnel from the Department of Homeland Security’s Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction office would be transferred into CISA, shifting broader chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear threat functions into the agency.
Congress would have to approve the entire budget structure in upcoming appropriations talks. Prior efforts to reduce CISA’s funding met resistance on Capitol Hill last year, when the White House sought roughly $490 million in reductions but ultimately faced pushback from lawmakers that significantly narrowed the scope of the cuts.
The budget preserves funding for various technical cybersecurity functions, including investments in threat hunting and analysis tools.
The proposal also includes about $4.9 million to support cybersecurity and incident response planning for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, designated as a National Special Security Event under DHS standards. The funding would support exercises, drone threat assessments and coordination with federal, state and local partners ahead of the games, even as the budget scales back many of the agency’s broader coordination efforts.
Additional funding would also be diverted toward CISA’s implementation of the Cyber Incident Reporting for Critical Infrastructure Act, or CIRCIA. Amid the ongoing DHS funding lapse, the cyber agency has been delayed in developing a final rule for the law, which, in essence, mandates critical infrastructure entities report major cyber incidents to CISA within 72 hours and ransomware payments within 24 hours.
Also notable is a small increase in funding and staffing for CISA’s Office of the Chief Counsel, which the justification cites as a rising volume of litigation, including cases on employment-related matters, as the agency moves forward with workforce reductions and other staffing changes. The increase suggests the agency is preparing for a heavier legal workload as it implements the proposed cuts.
The budget plans reflect long-standing skepticism from the Trump administration and its allies toward CISA, particularly over the agency’s role in 2020 election security efforts and concurrent work to counter false information online. Critics have argued the agency strayed beyond its “core” mission of infrastructure protection and federal cyber defense.
Cyber practitioners and former officials have frequently said that even the cuts put in place in the last year go too far.
“You don’t cut the fire department and then wonder why buildings burn. CISA isn’t the bureaucratic overhead; for practitioners it’s the lifeline between government intelligence and the private sector running the infrastructure this country depends on,” said Seemant Sehgal, founder and CEO of BreachLock, which sells a variety of cyberdefense services.
“Cutting its budget by $707 million, on top of what’s already been cut, is a gift to every nation-state actor that's been quietly targeting U.S. critical infrastructure,” he added.
The tensions between the Trump administration and CISA date back to the 2020 election, when its then-director Chris Krebs publicly affirmed the security of the vote and was subsequently dismissed by Trump. In his second term, Trump has continued to target Krebs, including ordering a federal investigation last year into his government tenure.
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