Texas denies Russian request to watch presidential poll

By Kasim Ileri

WASHINGTON

Texas has denied a request by Russia to observe how the state conducts the presidential election process in November, local media reported Friday.

“We are unable to accommodate your request to visit a polling station,” Texas Secretary of State Carlos Cascos wrote in response to the request last month by the Russian consul general in Houston.

In the correspondence acquired by the Texas Tribune newspaper, Cascos instead offered to arrange a briefing for Russian officials.

Cascos did not cite a specific reason for his denial.

Consul General Alexander K. Zakharov’s letter dated Sept. 24 asked that a delegation visit a polling site “with the goal of studying the U.S. experience in organization of voting process", according to the paper,

The paper also found that in addition to Texas, the states of Louisiana and Oklahoma also declined similar requests from Russia.

The disclosures comes amid discussions surrounding a recent hacking into Democratic National Convention email servers of which Russia is accused.

The White House said Russia’s intentions are “unclear” in asking to observe the vote.

“It's appropriate that people might be suspicious of their motives or at least their motives might be different than what they have publicly stated, given the nefarious activities that they've engaged in in cyberspace,” Earnest added.

WikiLeaks recently published hacked emails from DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz showing the committee’s lean toward presidential nominee Hillary Clinton over high-ranking Vermont lawmaker Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primaries.