National: Trump’s Favorite Voter-Fraud Activist Hedges His Claims | The Atlantic

Did 3 million people vote illegally in the 2016 election? There’s no evidence that’s true, but President Trump certainly believes so, making news his first week in the White House by ordering an investigation into that allegation. Even if only partly substantiated, it would probably be the single largest instance of voter fraud in American history. The source for Trump’s convictions seems to be a Twitter account run by Texan businessman and former public official Gregg Phillips, the founder of VoteStand, a mobile app designed to allow users to report incidents of voter fraud. Using data from conservative nonprofit True the Vote, Phillips claimed that he identified millions of illegal votes. Those claims went viral when published, were amplified by the conspiracy-theory website InfoWars, and ultimately reached the president himself. But those data have not yet been released, and questions about the credibility of their purveyor and his methods and claims abound. Even Phillips himself is now backing off the original 3 million number that sparked the president’s demand for an investigation, explaining that he needs more time before he’s willing to provide final numbers or release his raw data. “Over a hundred million people voted. Impacting a presidential election is probably less likely than impacting anything down-ballot,” Phillips said. “I’m not gonna be goaded into going faster than I want to. I’m not a government official, I don’t have protections, and if I accuse somebody of voter fraud, we have to be sure that what we’re saying is right. While I believe I’m right, it’s in my best interest and everybody else’s best interest to make sure this is right.”

National: Trump’s voter fraud unicorn could pose grave threat to voting rights | Philadelphia Tribune

Of the many conspiracy theories presented by President Donald Trump last week, none carried as much gravity as his crusade on voter fraud. “I will be asking for a major investigation into VOTER FRAUD,” he posted on Twitter earlier in the week, “including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and … even, those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time). Depending on results, we will strengthen up voting procedures!” How those “voting procedures” would be strengthened remained unclear. Yet, the hint of an exhaustive federal investigation into voter fraud rattled civil rights leaders who are already bracing for a wholesale rollback of key provisions in the Voting Rights Act.

National: The tale of a Trump falsehood: How his voter fraud claim spread like a virus | The Washington Post

The falsehood took root a week ago, when President Trump claimed in a private Jan. 23 meeting with top congressional leaders that between 3 million and 5 million undocumented immigrants illegally voted in November’s election. From there, the infection spread, strengthened with faulty evidence and scattered anecdotes: A congressman offered his own estimate of 2.4 million illegally registered voters. The White House press secretary misrepresented the findings of a study and suggested, with no evidence, that fraud happens in “big states, very populous states and urban areas.” Other Republicans pointed to an investigation of a small batch of voter registrations in Virginia, convictions for vote-buying in local races in Kentucky and a false statistic about voter turnout in Pennsylvania being suspiciously high in 2012. Within days, the stray comment at a reception — a variation on a false claim Trump had been making for months — led to the president’s call for an investigation, plans for an executive order and a promise from Vice President Pence to Republicans that the administration would “initiate a full evaluation of voting rolls.”

Editorials: The Kansas Model for Voter-Fraud Bluffing | Francis Wilkinson/Bloomberg

If President Donald Trump wants a good gauge of how much voter fraud he will find if he launches a federal investigation, one of his campaign advisers, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, is a good person to ask. Kobach, you might remember, became a national hero among conservatives by championing restrictions on voting, with the avowed purpose of battling the scourge of voter fraud. During Trump’s presidential transition, he was photographed meeting Trump while holding a document listing plans to bar foreigners and deal with “criminal aliens.” Illegal immigration and voter fraud are intimately linked in conservative mythology, where dusky undocumented immigrants are forever handing election victories to Democrats by voting illegally. Kobach is a smart lawyer and a skillful salesman. “Voter fraud is a well-documented reality in American elections,” he wrote in the Wall Street Journal after becoming Kansas’s secretary of state in 2011.

National: Trump’s voter fraud expert registered in 3 states | Associated Press

A man who President Donald Trump has promoted as an authority on voter fraud was registered to vote in multiple states during the 2016 presidential election, the Associated Press has learned. Gregg Phillips, whose unsubstantiated claim that the election was marred by 3 million illegal votes was tweeted by the president, was listed on the rolls in Alabama, Texas and Mississippi, according to voting records and election officials in those states. He voted only in Alabama in November, records show. In a post earlier this month, Phillips described “an amazing effort” by volunteers tied to True the Vote, an organization whose board he sits on, who he said found “thousands of duplicate records and registrations of dead people.” Trump has made an issue of people who are registered to vote in more than one state, using it as one of the bedrocks of his overall contention that voter fraud is rampant in the U.S. and that voting by 3 to 5 million immigrants illegally in the country cost him the popular vote in November. The AP found that Phillips was registered in Alabama and Texas under the name Gregg Allen Phillips, with the identical Social Security number. Mississippi records list him under the name Gregg A. Phillips, and that record includes the final four digits of Phillips’ Social Security number, his correct date of birth and a prior address matching one once attached to Gregg Allen Phillips. He has lived in all three states.

Editorials: Here’s How Trump’s Voter Fraud Investigation Could Produce Fake ‘Evidence’ | F. Perry Wilson/The Huffington Post

Somewhere, in a cubicle in Washington, a data analyst is panicking. She has just been asked by the Trump administration to show how 3 million people (or, preferably, more) voted illegally. Deep down, she knows that this is a ridiculous request. But she’s a team player. She will first try to identify specific cases of clear voter fraud. The goal will be to collate these clear cases into a list of names and addresses. A list with 3 million entries. She’ll start with the low-hanging fruit. She’ll cross-reference voting lists (not registration lists) to the National Death Index. She needs to look at real voting lists since dead people may still be on the registration lists without actually voting. She’ll find a few matches but, unfortunately, they will all prove to be false positives. People with the same name, people who didn’t really die, people who didn’t actually vote. She’ll then try to figure out if undocumented immigrants voted by cross-referencing voter lists with e-verify, the government’s electronic employment verification tool. She’ll get a few hits, but, again, they will all prove to be false positives. People with the same name, people who actually are citizens but aren’t in the system, and so on.

Michigan: Report: No evidence of Michigan voter fraud | The Detroit News

A conservative economic analysis firm on Monday released a report saying a comprehensive review of Michigan’s voting data shows no widespread voter fraud in the state, a point echoed last week by Secretary of State Ruth Johnson. The report by East Lansing-based Anderson Economic Group was prompted by claims of election tampering by Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein as well as President Donald Trump’s unsubstantiated assertion that 3 million to 5 million people voted illegally in the 2016 election. Trump argued that millions of illegal votes came from “those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and even those registered to vote who are dead,” a point that White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said could refer to states like New York and California where the Republican businessman did not campaign.

National: Dubious Vote-Fraud Claim Gets the Trump Seal of Approval | The New York Times

To support his call for a sweeping federal inquiry into his claims of vast voting fraud, President Trump turned on Friday to a little-known conservative activist whose work on the issue has been widely discredited and who has trafficked in conspiracy theories. “Gregg Phillips and crew say at least 3,000,000 votes were illegal,” Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter, a reference to a claim by Mr. Phillips, who helped create an app to report voter fraud, that he had “verified” such irregularities. With those words, Mr. Trump bestowed the imprimatur of the presidency on new ground: the feverish online fringes of American politics. In elevating Mr. Phillips, who last month on Twitter cited “spook friends” to claim that “the Israelis impersonated the Russians” and interfered in the American election, Mr. Trump returned to a familiar pattern. After a campaign in which he gave voice to outlandish falsehoods, including claims that Justice Antonin Scalia was suffocated by a pillow and Senator Ted Cruz’s father had a connection to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Mr. Trump has not left his penchant for conspiracy-mongering at the White House door.

National: Republicans in Congress don’t want anything to do with Trump’s voter-fraud probe | The Washington Post

If President Trump is waiting for the Republican Congress to join him in his quixotic quest to launch the first investigation in American history that will uncover systematic voter fraud — well, he may be waiting a while. ABC reported Wednesday that Trump would like Congress’s help as he launches a “major” investigation to find the 3 million to 5 million votes he claims were cast illegally. For a variety of political and logistical reasons — but mostly political — Congress will almost definitely not have Trump’s back. “We haven’t been discussing that,” House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) said in an interview Wednesday with MSNBC’s Greta Van Susteren when asked whether Congress would join in. “The president has 100,000 people at the Department of Justice, and if he wants to have an investigation, have at it,” Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), chairman of one of the top House investigative committees, told CNN.

Editorials: Voter fraud investigations have already happened. They don’t support Trump’s assertions. | Bangor Daily News

President Donald Trump, who has big and expensive plans to build a wall with Mexico and to make huge federal investments in the nation’s roads, bridges and airports, could save a little taxpayer money by forgoing a federal investigation into voter fraud. Trump tweeted Wednesday that he would launch a federal investigation of voter fraud, “including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and … even, those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time). Depending on results, we will strengthen up voting procedures!” Instead, he could review the reports already produced by and for people looking for voter fraud. Their conclusions: voter fraud is “extraordinarily rare.”

Editorials: There’s a reason Trump keeps lying about voter fraud | Jason Kander/The Washington Post

No doubt realizing that he was losing the cable-news message war, President Trump has called for a witch hunt in an attempt to prove the voter fraud lie he has been telling himself about why he lost the popular vote in November. On both sides of the aisle, conventional wisdom chalks this up to the president being a very insecure person struggling with the reality that 54 percent of American voters chose someone else, but that doesn’t give the president his due. Trump’s staggering inferiority complex clearly is just one of two reasons he’s telling the biggest version yet of a lie that his party has been telling about voter fraud for years. The other reason is that he’d like his party to win the 2018 midterm elections and he’d like to be reelected in 2020, and to do those things he needs to suppress voter turnout. By deliberately undermining confidence in the integrity of our democracy, the president can make it quite a bit easier for his party to push legislation making it harder for certain eligible voters to vote. Curtailing voting rights by dishonestly inventing widespread fraud has been a major part of the Republican Party’s political strategy for a while. Now that plan is getting a major boost from a president who has no problem just making stuff up.

National: Trump’s call for election-fraud probe fraught with peril | Politico

President Donald Trump has put himself in a vexing position with his promise of a “major” voter fraud investigation, with little chance of proving his unsubstantiated claim that millions voted illegally in November and a high probability the effort will be panned as a fruitless political exercise. If Trump tries to kick-start an aggressive criminal investigation, he is sure to fuel charges he is politicizing the Justice Department. If instead he chooses a more modest, blue ribbon panel-style inquiry, Trump is likely to have trouble attracting prominent Democrats who could give the effort more legitimacy. Former Justice Department officials warned Wednesday that conducting a presidentially directed, wide-scale probe into election fraud would put top lawyers there in the uncomfortable position of having to pass judgment on a claim repeatedly leveled by Trump, but lacking in evidence: that 3 million to 5 million people voted illegally in the election that delivered him to the White House. “If you do launch an investigation like this, prosecutors would be under enormous pressure not to find that the president was wrong. What if the report is inconclusive?” said Matthew Miller, a Justice Department spokesman under Attorney General Eric Holder. “Voter fraud is a crime, and DOJ usually begins investigations when they find evidence a crime was committed, not because the president has endorsed a conspiracy theory for which there is no evidence. Now, we’re in a position where DOJ has to launch an investigation into a supposed crime just because the president is making up facts?”

National: Trump’s call for probe of voter fraud sparks backlash | Reuters

President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would seek an investigation into what he believes was voter fraud in last November’s election, despite an overwhelming consensus among state officials, election experts, and politicians that it is rare in the United States. The announcement drew rebukes from both Republicans and Democrats who said the Republican president’s unsubstantiated claims of large-scale fraud could undermine voting rights efforts as well as confidence in the new U.S. chief executive. In the Nov. 8 election, Trump lost the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton by nearly 3 million ballots. Irked by that large figure, he has blamed voter fraud without citing evidence. “I will be asking for a major investigation into VOTER FRAUD, including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and….even, those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time),” Trump said on Twitter. “Depending on results, we will strengthen up voting procedures!” In an interview with ABC News, Trump said none of the illegal votes would have been cast for him. “They would all be for the other side,” he said. White House press secretary Sean Spicer later told a news briefing that the probe would not focus on only the 2016 election.

Editorials: The Voter Fraud Fantasy | The New York Times

There are varying degrees of absurdity in the fallacies President Trump peddled during his first week in the Oval Office. Perhaps the most damaging was his insistence that millions of Americans voted illegally in the election he narrowly won. Mr. Trump first made that false claim in late November, tweeting that he would have won the popular vote “if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.” On Wednesday, he announced that he intended to launch a “major investigation” into voting fraud and suggested the outcome may justify tightening voting rules. What once seemed like another harebrained claim by a president with little regard for the truth must now be recognized as a real threat to American democracy. Mr. Trump is telegraphing his administration’s intent to provide cover for longstanding efforts by Republicans to suppress minority voters by purging voting rolls, imposing onerous identification requirements and curtailing early voting. “This is another attempt to undermine our democracy,” said Representative Barbara Lee of California, one of the states where Mr. Trump falsely claimed results were tainted by large-scale fraud. “It’s about not honoring and recognizing demographic change.”

National: White House postpones executive action on voter fraud investigation | Politico

The White House said that President Donald Trump would sign an executive action to begin an investigation into voter fraud on Friday or Saturday, postponing a move that had been expected on Thursday. According to a pool report, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters late Thursday afternoon that Trump returned “a little late” from the Republican leadership retreat in Philadelphia and “got jammed up on some meetings that needed to occur,” prompting the delay. Earlier in the day, Spicer had said that Trump planned to sign the action around 4:30 p.m. The question of voter fraud has been in the news for most of the week. Trump took to Twitter on Wednesday to call for a “major” probe into voter fraud and irregularities in the voter rolls, two days after he repeated his false claim that he lost the popular vote because millions of people voted illegally for Hillary Clinton in November.

National: It turns out Jared Kushner and Sean Spicer are also registered to vote in two states | The Washington Post

Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and one of his closest White House advisers, is registered to vote in both New Jersey and New York, while White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer is on the rolls both in Virginia and his home state of Rhode Island, according to elections officials and voting registration records. Their dual registrations offer two more high-profile examples of how common it is for voters to be on the rolls in multiple states — something Trump has claimed is evidence of voter fraud. With Kushner and Spicer, The Washington Post has now identified five Trump family members or top administration appointees who were registered in two states during the fall election. The others are chief White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon; Tiffany Trump, the president’s youngest daughter; and Treasury Secretary nominee Steven Mnuchin, as first reported by CNN. White House officials did not respond to requests for comment.

National: Illegal Voting Claims, and Why They Don’t Hold Up | The New York Times

There isn’t any evidence to support President Trump’s assertion that three to five million illegal votes were cast in the 2016 presidential election. But there is one study that has been interpreted to suggest it is at least possible. It found that between 32,000 and 2.8 million noncitizen voters might have fraudulently cast ballots in the 2008 presidential election. The study, based on a survey of 38,000 people after that election, has been under fire since it was published in 2014. Now even its authors concede that it probably overstated the amount of noncitizen voting. “The high-end estimates are likely incorrect,” Jesse Richman, one of the co-authors of the study and a political science professor at Old Dominion University, said in an email exchange on Wednesday. In a post online, he also said that the findings do not support Mr. Trump’s contention that millions cast ballots illegally. Mr. Richman still maintains that some small percentage of noncitizens vote in American elections. But the debate over this study has moved on. It’s no longer about whether millions of illegal votes were cast, but whether there’s any evidence for noncitizen voting at all. The study’s bold claims fell apart because of something called response error: the possibility that people taking a survey don’t answer a question correctly — in this case, a question about being American citizens.

National: Mike Pence: Trump administration planning ‘full evaluation’ of voter fraud | The Guardian

Vice-President Mike Pence said that the Trump administration will “initiate a full evaluation of voting rolls in the country and the overall integrity of our voting system in the wake of this past election”, according to audio obtained by the Guardian. Trump has pledged an investigation of voter fraud in the wake of his unfounded claims that between 3 million and 5 million fraudulent votes were cast in the 2016 election. In response to a question from Congressman Mo Brooks of Alabama, who described Trump as being “spot on” on the issue, Pence described the investigation that the administration is planning on undertaking. The vice-president, who focused on a Pew Research Center report often cited by Trump that referenced issues with faulty voter registrations, pledged to members of Congress: “We’ll be looking at ways to work with you and follow the facts and see where the facts go.” The White House is expected to release an executive order on voter fraud in the coming days. Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, described the effort to reporters on Wednesday as an attempt “to understand where the problem exists, how deep it goes”. Spicer indicated that potential fraud only happened in “the bigger states”.

National: Trump voter fraud claims could fall to Jeff Sessions | USA Today

If President Trump follows through on his call for an inquiry into unsubstantiated claims of massive voter fraud, the request would likely land on the desk of a man whose own history of pursuing such allegations continues to shadow his public record. Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, who is awaiting likely confirmation as Trump’s attorney general, was forced to defend himself earlier this month during Senate hearings on his nomination for the failed, racially charged prosecution of three black activists more than 30 years ago. In that case, Sessions, then the chief federal prosecutor in Mobile, Ala., charged Albert Turner Sr., his wife, Evelyn Turner, and Spencer Hogue with tampering with absentee ballots in a September 1984 primary election. All three were quickly acquitted in a case that raised the specter of voter intimidation and later helped sink Sessions’ previous bid for a federal judgeship.

Editorials: Trump’s Lies Pave the Way for an Assault on Voting Rights | Dale Ho/The New York Times

President Trump lost the popular vote by nearly three million votes, the largest negative margin for anyone elected president in the modern era. But on Monday, during his first official meeting with congressional leaders, Mr. Trump insisted that he actually won the popular vote — once you subtract the three million to five million illegally cast ballots, all of which he says, were cast “for the other side.” Now he is calling for a major federal investigation into election fraud that, according to the White House press secretary, will focus on “urban areas” in “big states” that Mr. Trump lost, like California and New York. Here are the (non-alternative) facts: There were more than 135 million ballots cast in November. A careful review by The Washington Post documented a grand total of just four cases of voter fraud nationwide — including an Iowa woman who voted twice for Mr. Trump. And during the recount litigation in Michigan, the president’s own legal team told a court that “all available evidence suggests that the 2016 general election was not tainted by fraud or mistake.” But don’t take it from them. Just ask yourself if this story seems plausible: Sophisticated cheats committed widespread election fraud to the tune of five million votes and vanished without a trace. But they forgot to steal 80,000 votes in three states (Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin) that would have been decisive for Hillary Clinton. It’s as if the thieves from “Ocean’s Eleven” broke into Fort Knox, left behind the gold bars and took a stamp collection.

Editorials: Voting Fraud Inquiry? The Investigators Got Burned Last Time | Michael Waldman/The New York Times

For days President Trump has promoted the absurd notion that three million to five million people voted illegally in the presidential election. … When a president demands an investigation of voter fraud, what could go wrong? Based on recent history, a lot. Little more than a decade ago, the Justice Department made investigating and prosecuting voter fraud a major priority. When top prosecutors failed to find the misconduct and refused to make partisan prosecutions, they were fired. In the fallout, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was forced to resign in the biggest Justice Department scandal since Watergate. It seems like an odd bit of history to try to repeat — unless the goal is to clear the path for voter suppression. Let’s begin with the underlying fact: There is no epidemic of voter fraud. After Mr. Trump claimed the election was rigged, election officials from both parties, scholars, journalists and experts noted that there was simply no widespread fraud. Mr. Trump’s lawyers even confirmed this in their own court filings in recount efforts in Michigan. There was no extensive voting fraud in 2002, either, when President George W. Bush’s attorney general, John Ashcroft, made finding it a top priority for the Department of Justice. And the federal prosecutors kept coming up empty. After years of trying, they had charged more people with violating migratory bird laws than voting statutes.

Florida: Trump’s voter fraud claims spark backlash in Florida | Tampa Bay Times

President Donald Trump’s unfounded claims that millions of people voted illegally in November brought a torrent of criticism Wednesday from Florida elections experts and legislators, who demanded a federal investigation they say will prove Trump wrong. On his sixth day in office, Trump took to Twitter to say he will seek a “major investigation into VOTER FRAUD, including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and even those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time).” At least three in Trump’s inner circle fit his description of voter fraud. His chief campaign strategist, Stephen Bannon, was registered in New York and Florida until Wednesday. His nominee to run the Treasury department, Steven Mnuchin, is registered to vote in New York and California, CNN reported. And his own daughter, Tiffany Trump, has been registered to vote in two states, New York and Pennsylvania. Florida Democrats pounced. In a letter sent Wednesday to Gov. Rick Scott’s top elections official, Senate Democratic leader Oscar Braynon urged a state investigation of voter fraud “in the interests of reassuring the citizens of this state and Mr. Trump that his election to the presidency was beyond reproach.”

Mississippi: Voter fraud probe traced back to ex-Mississippi welfare head | The Clarion Ledger

The former Mississippi official whose tweet may have inspired President Trump to order a “major investigation” into voter fraud in the 2016 presidential election says he has been receiving death threats. “There are people who want to kill me,” ex-welfare head Gregg Phillips told The Clarion-Ledger. “It’s insane.” PolitiFact and others have traced the original claim regarding fraud on Election Day to Phillips, who in the past has been accused of profiting from connections he made while serving in government — something he has denied. After Trump’s victory, Phillips tweeted out, “We have verified more than three million votes cast by non-citizens. We are joining @truethevote to initiate legal action.” Then he tweeted: “Completed analysis of database of 180 million voter registrations. Number of non-citizen votes exceeds 3 million. Consulting legal team.” InfoWars published a story with the headline, “Report: Three Million Votes in Presidential Election Cast by Illegal Aliens. Trump may have won popular vote.” The Drudge Report picked up the story, too.

National: Trump wants to spend millions on voter fraud that doesn’t exist | Miami Herald

President Donald Trump wants to potentially spend tens of millions of taxpayer dollars to examine a problem that’s been proven over and over not to exist: systemic voter fraud. Trump, in tweets Wednesday, announced that he’ll seek a “major investigation” into voter fraud, echoing his unsubstantiated claim that some 3 million to 5 million people voted illegally in November’s election, helping to propel Democrat Hillary Clinton to a big popular-vote advantage. The president’s fraud claim is emphatically rebuffed by the nation’s secretaries of states, who monitor elections, as well as reams of government and academic studies that say that occurrences of voter fraud are infinitesimal. “We are not aware of any evidence that supports the voter fraud claims made by President Trump,” the National Association of Secretaries of State said in a statement Tuesday. “In the lead-up to the November 2016 election, secretaries of state expressed their confidence in the systemic integrity of our election process as a bipartisan group, and they stand behind that statement today.” Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, a Republican, felt compelled to do a tweet of his own challenging Trump’s assertion. “We conducted a review 4 years ago in Ohio & already have a statewide review of 2016 election underway. Easy to vote, hard to cheat,” he tweeted. Apparently, even Trump’s lawyers don’t believe voter fraud was a problem in the 2016 election. His lawyers objected in a court filing to Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein’s Michigan recount petition last year, Business Insider reported Wednesday. “On what basis does Stein seek to disenfranchise Michigan citizens?” the filing said. “None really, save for speculation. All available evidence suggests that the 2016 general election was not tainted by fraud or mistake.”

National: Voting rights advocates fear Trump’s unfounded fraud claims will lead to more restrictive laws | The Washington Post

President Trump’s plans to ask for a “major investigation” into allegations of widespread voter fraud were met with skepticism by both Democratic and Republican lawmakers — and fear from voting rights advocates that the president will use his unfounded claims to justify more-restrictive voting laws. It is unclear who will investigate Trump’s belief that he lost the popular vote in November’s election because millions of illegal votes were cast. The president could set up an independent commission or task force to look into the claims, which have already been disproved by many national studies. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said the president’s investigation would examine “the integrity of our voting system” and not just the 2016 election. The Justice Department, which investigates claims of election crimes, has not historically launched a criminal investigation at the request of a president. An attorney general could order an investigation, but Trump’s nominee, Sen. Jeff Sessions, has not yet been confirmed, and his spokeswoman declined to comment. Justice officials said they knew nothing about an investigation into voter fraud and referred questions to the White House.

National: Trump’s voter fraud claims undermine the democratic process and his presidency | The Washington Post

There is no benign explanation for President Trump’s false assertion that millions of people voted illegally in the last election. It is either a deliberate attempt to undermine faith in the democratic process, an exhortation to those who favor new restrictions on access to the ballot box or the worrisome trait of someone with immense power willing to make wild statements without any credible evidence. By repeating as president what he had said as a candidate, for whatever purpose, Trump is striking at the foundation of a democratic society. This is yet another example of Trump being willing to cast doubt on information, individuals or institutions that he believes threaten his legitimacy, challenge his authority or question his actions — from attacks on “phony polls” or the “dishonest media” to assertions now of vast voter fraud. This is not a debate about the size of the crowd at last week’s presidential inauguration. That is a piddling controversy compared with his claim that the election system overseen by the states is somehow riddled with fraud. Trump is chipping away at a shared public confidence in a system that is fundamental to a representative government for no apparent reason other than that he’s bothered by the fact that, although duly elected and now in the White House, he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by almost 3 million votes.

National: Author of Trump’s Favorite Voter Fraud Study Says Everyone’s Wrong | WIRED

Jesse Richman used to be one of those researchers who only dreamed his work might someday capture national attention—maybe even inspire some sort of systemic change. On Ratemyprofessor.com, his students describe him as tough but fair, a “genius” who was liberal with extra credit projects and went out of his way to offer help. In 2014, Richman’s world changed when he co-authored a paper on voter fraud that instantly caught fire. At first, he was energized by all the buzz and proud to get his work published. Now, he says, “there are days I wish I hadn’t.” That’s because his paper, “Do Non-Citizens Vote in US Elections?” which was published in the peer-reviewed journal Electoral Studies, has become a cornerstone of President Trump’s false claim that he would have “won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.” This week White House Press secretary Sean Spicer once again dragged the study to the forefront, noting that a study of the 2008 election (which he wrongly attributed to Pew Research) showed 14 percent of non-citizens are registered to vote. That was Richman’s research, all right. The problem, says Richman, who identifies as a political moderate, is that the Trump administration’s interpretation of his report is totally off. “Trump and others have been misreading our research and exaggerating our results to make claims we don’t think our research supports,” Richman says. “I’m not sure why they continue to do it, but there’s not much I can do about that aside from set the record straight.”

National: Tiffany Trump, Steve Bannon, Steven Mnuchin Registered to Vote in Multiple States | US News

President Donald Trump called for an investigation into alleged voter fraud, including whether citizens are registered to vote in more than one state, but least one member of his family, one of his senior aides, and a Cabinet nominee have been found to be registered in at least two states. “I will be asking for a major investigation into VOTER FRAUD, including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and even, those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time),” Trump tweeted Wednesday. “Depending on results, we will strengthen up voting procedure.” Trump’s nominee to be the secretary of the Treasury, former Goldman Sachs partner Steven Mnuchin, is registered to vote in both New York and California, according to a review of documents by CNN.

National: President Trump Calls For Probe Into Unsubstantiated Voter Fraud Claim | Fortune

President Donald Trump declared Wednesday that he is ordering a “major investigation” into widespread voter fraud, raising the prospect of a federal government probe into a widely debunked claim and sparking alarm among experts and Democrats.
Trump announced in a pair of early morning tweets that the investigation will look at those registered to vote in more than one state, “those who are illegal and … even, those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time).” Depending on results, the Republican tweeted on his sixth day in office, “we will strengthen up voting procedures!” He went further later Wednesday, claiming: “You have people registered in two states. They’re registered in a New York and a New Jersey. They vote twice.” “There are millions of votes, in my opinion,” Trump told ABC. “Of those votes cast, none of them come to me. None of them come to me.” All 50 states and the District of Columbia have finalized their election results with no reports of the kind of widespread fraud that Trump alleges.

National: Trump’s Voter Fraud Example? A Troubled Tale With Bernhard Langer | The New York Times

On Monday, President Trump gathered House and Senate leaders in the State Dining Room for a get-to-know-you reception, served them tiny meatballs and pigs-in-a-blanket, and quickly launched into a story meant to illustrate what he believes to be rampant, unchecked voter fraud. Mr. Trump kicked off the meeting, participants said, by retelling his debunked claim that he would have won the popular vote if not for the three million to five million ballots cast by “illegals.” He followed it up with a Twitter post early Wednesday calling for a major investigation into voter fraud. When one of the Democrats protested, Mr. Trump said he was told a story by “the very famous golfer, Bernhard Langer,” whom he described as a friend, according to three staff members who were in the room for the meeting. In the emerging Trump era, the story was a memorable example, for the legislators and the country, of how an off-the-cuff yarn — unverifiable and of confusing origin — became a prime policy mover for a president whose fact-gathering owes more to the oral tradition than the written word. The three witnesses recall the story this way: Mr. Langer, a 59-year-old native of Bavaria, Germany — a winner of the Masters twice and of more than 100 events on major professional golf tours around the world — was standing in line at a polling place near his home in Florida on Election Day, the president explained, when an official informed Mr. Langer he would not be able to vote.