Ohio county official denies knowing about attempted breach of election network

John Hamercheck, president of Ohio's Lake County Board of Commissioners, on Tuesday denied knowing about any attempts to breach the county's election network during the spring primary.

Driving the news: According to the Washington Post, a private laptop was plugged into the network inside Hamercheck's government office on May 4. No sensitive data was obtained.

• "But routine network traffic captured by the computer was circulated at an August 'cyber symposium' on alleged election fraud hosted by MyPillow executive Mike Lindell, an ally of former president Donald Trump," the Post wrote Tuesday. There has been no evidence of election fraud during the 2020 election.
• The Post reported last week that the FBI and state agencies were investigating the incident.

What he's saying: "To my knowledge there was never an attempt to access or breach the Lake County Board of Elections computer network that day," Hamercheck said at a board meeting Tuesday.

• He said that he has not been questioned by any agencies probing the incident.
• He added that he would share more information "as soon as we're finished gathering and verifying the appropriate materials."

The big picture: "The Lake County incident bears similarities to events in Colorado earlier this year, when government officials helped an outsider gain access to the county voting system in an effort to find fraud," the Post reported Tuesday.

Editor's note: This post has been corrected to reflect that news about FBI and state agency investigations was reported last week (not in May).