As we close in on the one-year anniversary of Donald Trump’s inauguration, one of the constants in his first year as President of the United States now seems to be poised to disappear into the background. Today, after railing against his former Chief of Staff Steve Bannon, Trump has signed an executive order dissolving his voter fraud commission he created last May despite “substantial evidence of voter fraud.”
The White House released the following statement after the order was signed (via Jon Passantino of Buzzfeed News):
“Despite substantial evidence of voter fraud, many states have refused to provide the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity with basic information relevant to its inquiry. Rather than engage in endless legal battles at taxpayer expense, today I signed an executive order to dissolve the commission, and have asked the Department of Homeland Security to review these issues and determine next courses of action.”
Trump has long held the belief that voter fraud in the 2016 election led to Hillary Clinton winning the popular vote, and White House officials said in July that the 41 states refusing to comply with the requests for voter information were doing so because it would show that Clinton didn’t actually win the popular vote.
Polls in late July showed that nearly half of all Trump supporters actually believe he won the popular vote, with millions of illegal voters boosting Clinton’s total. Officially, she won the popular vote by 2.9 million.