Despite the fact that these claims have been widely debunked, at times even on their own network, the pundits on this Saturday's Fox & Friends continue to hype Donald Trump's assertion that there's massive voter fraud in the United States.
HUNTSMAN: That was President Obama, blasting Donald Trump's concerns that voter fraud is playing an active role in this election. But should Trump's worries be taken seriously?
CARLSON: For more on this, we bring in contributor to The Federalist and Real Clear Politics John Gibbs. John, it's great to is he you this morning. So last year in the state of California, half of all drivers licenses were issued to illegal aliens. We're seeing this in other states too. Why should I not not be worried about voter fraud in if illegal aliens have drivers licenses?
GIBBS: You know, it's really a huge problem Tucker. When you go to your... to vote, you have to show your ID. It's a common sense requirement. To get on an airplane you need an ID, to want to buy a beer, you have to show an ID. When you want to rent a car show an ID, so it's really legitimate.
The push back from the other side is look, this is racist. Many minorities don't have valid ID to vote. Therefore requiring them to show an ID is is racist. But the data from North Carolina shows that actually after they passed their voter ID law, which was struck down unfortunately, but after they passed it, you actually had a higher black turnout than before. So there's actually no merit to this idea that it suppresses minority turnout.
HUNTSMAN: Yeah, Donald Trump is bringing up I think a concern that people have had for years now. We're talking about illegal immigrants being able to vote, people that have died that are able to vote, people that vote more than once. Why is this so hard to detect? Why are we even wondering if this is a real issue? Because we have some of the facts, right? This is a real thing.
GIBBS: Yeah, so if you look at almost every state that tries to keep any data on this, there are actually many cases of it happening. You look at Virginia, there was over 1,000 illegal immigrants that were caught voting and this is only after they self-reported when they tried to renew their drivers license. So, and also, that did not even include the counties outside of the major metropolitan cities. These are in outlying areas. So this is just 1,000 cases of people that reported themselves. Imagine how many other cases there are of people that are not reporting.
If you look at what is happening in Colorado. There is a woman who died in 2009. Then she voted in 2011 and 2012. So there is actually quite a few cases of this happening. And the broader scale, Pew Research did a study in 2012 in which they found that one out of eight voter registrations was inaccurate or invalid, which amounts to about 18 million voter registrations across the country. There's almost 2 million dead people that are still on the roles. So it's just a really big issue.
CARLSON: So I mean, I kind of agree with these hysterical liberals on this, which is it's bad if people lose faith in the system. So why wouldn't they spend their time trying to restore faith integrity to the system rather than denouncing Trump?
GIBBS: Yeah, so this brings up a good question as far as that view. Are the Republicans doing this or are the Democrats do this? Well, look at who's fighting against the most. Who's fighting voter ID? They have the most to benefit from it.
CARLSON: That's a great point. Thanks John.
As the article linked above from Media Matters noted, they're conflating inaccuracies in voter registrations with so-called "voter fraud" and cases of actual in-person voter fraud are actually very rare:
Right-wing media have baselessly stoked fears of widespread voter fraud based on out-of-date or inaccurate voter registration rolls to defend Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s claims that “dead people” and “illegal aliens” are voting. But in doing so they’ve falsely conflated possible registration fraud with the practice of in-person voter fraud; both types are rare, and the latter is virtually nonexistent. [...]
The Pew Report Cited By Trump And Right-Wing Media Doesn’t -- And Doesn’t Claim To -- Show Voter Fraud
Experts: Pew Report Shows Inaccuracies In Voter Registration But “There’s No Evidence That The Errors Lead To Fraud.” When the Pew study came out in 2012, USA Today noted that “experts say there’s no evidence” that the errors shown in the report -- that “more than 24 million voter-registration records in the United States - about one in eight - are inaccurate, out-of-date, or duplicates” -- “lead to fraud on Election Day.” The USA Today report cited David Becker, the director of Pew’s election initiatives, who said, “The perception of the possibility of fraud drives hyper-partisan policymaking.” From the February 2012 report:
More than 24 million voter-registration records in the United States— about one in eight — are inaccurate, out-of-date or duplicates. Nearly 2.8 million people are registered in two or more states, and perhaps 1.8 million registered voters are dead.
Those estimates, from a report published today by the non-partisan Pew Center on the States, portray a largely paper-based system that is outmoded, expensive and error-prone.
"We have a ramshackle registration system in the U.S. It's a mess. It's expensive. There isn't central control over the process," said Lawrence Norden of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.
Experts say there's no evidence that the errors lead to fraud on Election Day. "The perception of the possibility of fraud drives hyper-partisan policymaking," said David Becker, director of Pew's election initiatives. But inactive voters do cost money. Inaccurate lists mean wasted money on mailings and extra paper ballots. [Pew Center On The States, February 2012; USA Today, 2/14/12]
Voter Registration Irregularities Are Not The Same As In-Person Voter Fraud
Brennan Center For Justice: There Are Four Types Of Voter Registration Fraud Allegations, But It Is “Extraordinarily Difficult” To Find Cases Of Registration Fraud Resulting In In-Person Voter Fraud. The Brennan Center’s comprehensive The Truth About Voter Fraud report outlines four different types of voter registration fraud allegations. They include instances of individuals “intentionally submitting forms in the name of someone (or something) ineligible,” examples of non-fraud like “registration forms submitted by eligible voters, but with errors or omissions,” allegations against “registrative drive workers,” and charges of “individuals who change or manipulate the registration of an eligible voter to frustrate her ability to vote.” The report emphasizes that despite “documented and widely publicized instances in which registration forms have been fraudulently completed … it is extraordinarily difficult to find reported cases in which individuals have submitted registration forms in someone else’s name in order to impersonate them at the polls.” From the 2007 report:
There have been several documented and widely publicized instances in which registration forms have been fraudulently completed and submitted. But it is extraordinarily difficult to find reported cases in which individuals have submitted registration forms in someone else’s name in order to impersonate them at the polls. Furthermore, most reports of registration fraud do not actually claim that the fraud happens so that ineligible people can vote at the polls. Indeed, we are aware of no recent substantiated case in which registration fraud has resulted in fraudulent votes being cast.
Instead, when registration fraud is alleged, the allegations generally fall into one of four categories:
The first type of allegation concerns individuals intentionally submitting forms in the name of someone (or something) ineligible in order to have some fun or — more often — to make a point.139 Most of the infamous stories of dogs on the rolls fall into this category, including a recent incident in Washington State.140 Most of the time, these forms are discovered and investigated by local officials before they make it onto the rolls. There are no reports that we have discovered of votes actually cast in the names of such registrants.
The second type of allegation concerns “fraud” that is not actually fraud at all. This includes registration forms submitted by eligible voters, but with errors or omissions.141 Such mistakes are relatively common, but do not represent fraud. Similarly, there are many jurisdictions in which the registration rolls are inflated with the names of eligible voters who have moved or died or otherwise become ineligible.142 These lingering entries also do not represent fraud; furthermore, as states build and improve the statewide voter registration databases now required by federal law, it will become easier to remove ineligible voters from the rolls while maintaining safeguards for eligible registrants.
The third type of allegation concerns registration drive workers, who may be paid for their time or on the basis of how many forms they submit,143 and who intentionally submit fraudulent forms. The allegations may involve forms submitted in the names of fictional voters, as in the case of “Jive Turkey,”144 or with the names of actual voters but a false address or a forged signature.145 Most of the cases of registration fraud that are prosecuted fall into this category.146 If voter registration drives have enough time and are allowed by law to review the forms submitted by their workers, they can often catch these forms and draw them to the attention of local elections officials.147 These forms actually defraud the voter registration drives, which compensate workers on the expectation that their time will be spent registering new and eligible citizens; the worker herself is interested not in defrauding the government, but in getting credit for work she didn’t do. When drives are able to flag these forms for elections officials, the forms are investigated, not processed, and the worker can be investigated and prosecuted. There are no reports that we have discovered of votes actually cast in the names of such registrants.
Finally, the fourth type of allegation involves individuals who change or manipulate the registration of an eligible voter to frustrate her ability to vote.149 Like the deliberate destruction of forms,150 these incidents are rare and most often committed by partisan actors. Most states criminalize the intentional destruction of registration forms or fraudulent submission of forms. Like the allegations of fraud by election officials, these incidents do not concern allegations of fraud by individual voters, and we do not address them in detail here. [Brennan Center, 2007]