US President Donald Trump is to sign an executive order launching a commission to review alleged voter fraud and voter suppression in the US election system, according to three White House officials.
In a statement Thursday afternoon, Leahy said the commission's membership exposes it as a political sham.
Vice President Mike Pence has been named the chairman of the commission and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach as the vice-chair.
Tasked with examining the registration and voting processes used in federal elections, the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity must submit a report to Trump on practices that enhance and undermine Americans' confidence in voting integrity. "I urge my executive and legislative colleagues to remain vigilant, to protect our citizens' rights, and to follow Vermont's lead as a State which provides open and fair ballot access through same day and automatic voter registration, early voting and online registration - all without a single substantiated complaint of voter fraud in the last decade".
The commission is the official follow-through on Trump's unsubstantiated claim that several million "illegals" voted for his Democratic rival and robbed him of a victory in the national popular vote.
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For the record, that potential number of matches for April and May is only 16, including a possible Europa League final. You've either got to back him in the way he manages or be totally against him no matter what the result is.
Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach is seen on November 20, 2016 in Bedminster, N.J. He has been advising Trump, who right after his election claimed that he lost the popular vote because millions of undocumented immigrants voted illegally. He has advocated the proof-of-citizenship requirement at the federal level as well, citing rampant voter fraud without producing proof of a widespread problem.
Other participants include Democrats and Republicans involved in election administration at the state level, including the secretaries of state of Indiana, Maine and New Hampshire.
She says the group plans to complete its work with a report to the president by 2018. The commission will also include former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a Republican, and U.S. Elections Assistance Commission member Christie McCormick. Those measures make it less likely that the kind of people who will vote for Democrats - particularly African-Americans but also Latinos, young people, and urban dwellers - will manage to register and vote. "He fired the person investigating a real threat to election integrity, and set up a probe of an imaginary threat".
In a lunch meeting with senators in February, Trump said that he and former Republican Sen.
"Putting an extremist like Mr. Kobach at the helm of this commission is akin to putting an arsonist in charge of the fire department", charged Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). He has clashed repeatedly with voting rights groups and is now stuck in a contentious court battle with the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed a lawsuit claiming his office sought to turn back Kansas voters in violation the National Voter Registration Act.
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