Trump Seeks "Major Investigation" of Debunked Vote Fraud Claims
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, good evening. Thanks for joining us. Hope you had a good day. We are coming to you tonight from Studio 51 where people are arriving for a special Van Jones CNN "MESSY TRUTH" town hall featuring Whoopi Goldberg. It gets under way at the top of the next hour. As for this hour, there's certainly no shortage of news. It's been that way nearly every day since President Trump took office. As you know, he's been busy signing orders and largely making good on some of his key campaign issues. But he's also been dealing with controversy after making two demonstrably false claims since taking office. Now, some of Mr. Trump's supporters on this program and elsewhere have said that these false claims are not a story, that the American people don't care about these things. They say our focus should be on those executive actions instead. The fact is we think we can and will do both as we've done since Mr. Trump took office. It's a big deal if the president of the United States says things that aren't true. We think words and facts matter. It's also a big deal when a new president signs a dozen executive actions in six days. So, as we have each night, tonight, we'll cover all of those stories and the hour ahead. We begin with Mr. Trump's call for a federal investigation into the widely debunked allegations of voter fraud. New comments by the president to David Muir on ABC's "World News Tonight." Take a look.</s>DAVID MUIR, ABC'S "WORLD NEWS TONIGHT" ANCHOR: But what I'm asking, what I'm asking --</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: People --</s>MUIR: When you say "in your opinion" and "millions of illegal votes" -- that is something that is extremely fundamental to our functioning democracy, a fair and free election.</s>TRUMP: Sure, sure.</s>MUIR: You say you're going to launch an investigation in this.</s>TRUMP: Sure. Done.</s>MUIR: What you have presented so far has been debunked. It's been called false. I called --</s>TRUMP: Take a look at the Pew reports --</s>MUIR: I called the author of the Pew report last night and he told me that they found no evidence of voter fraud.</s>TRUMP: Really? Then why did he write the report?</s>MUIR: He said, "No evidence of voter fraud."</s>TRUMP: Excuse me. Then why did he write the report? Then he's groveling again. You know, I always talk about the reporters that grovel when they want to write something that you want to hear but not necessarily millions of people want to hear, or have to hear.</s>MUIR: So, you've launched an investigation.</s>TRUMP: We're going to launch an investigation to find out and then the next time -- and I will say this: of those votes cast, none of them come to me. None of them come to me. They would all be for the other side. None of them come to me. But when you look at the people that are registered, dead, illegal, and two states and in some cases maybe three states, we have a lot to look into.</s>COOPER: Well, just before air time, House Speaker Paul Ryan weighed in, telling MSNBC's Greta Van Susteren that he has not seen evidence of widespread fraud. However, he supports an investigation. GOP Congressman Jason Chaffetz who chairs the House Oversight Committee says the president can do what he wants with the Justice Department but his committee is not planning to investigate. Joining us now, right now, is David Becker, the one responsible for that Pew report that President Trump mentioned and the one he says is now groveling. David, appreciate you being with us. You were with us last night. You didn't seem to be groveling to me last night. You don't appear to be groveling tonight. We'll see how the interview goes. You heard President Trump in that clip saying to, quote, "take a look at the Pew reports." So, let's do that. The report, which I want to point out, you authored, did it find there was any widespread voter fraud?</s>DAVID BECKER, EXEC. DIR., CENTER FOR ELECTION INNOVATION & RESEARCH: So I contributed to that report when I was at Pew, and it was released in February of 2012. That report made no findings with regard to fraud whatsoever. The report does not hide the ball at all. It's not a very long report. I encourage everyone to go to the Pew website. It's still up there and read it. It's a very interesting study of what the voter rolls looked like five years ago, trying to determine what exactly were the challenges election officials faced in keeping voter lists up to date as people moved. But as the report itself says and as I stated at the time in 2012 and I stated subsequently even before the election when this came up, it just makes no findings with regard to fraud.</s>COOPER: So, we should point out voter fraud -- you know, people being registered in two states, somebody dead still on the rolls, that is not voter fraud. Voter fraud is somebody voting illegally, somebody who should not be voting, correct?</s>BECKER: Yes. That's a very important point. Literally, millions of people are moving in any given year and when they move, they might go to their new state, they might get a new drive's license, register to vote in their new state but they don't think to cancel their voter registration in their previous state. In fact, it's very difficult to do even if they thought to try to do that. And that's why we see things like the news today that the treasury secretary nominee and adviser Steve Bannon both have active registrations in multiple states.</s>COOPER: Right. So does Tiffany Trump, the president's daughter.</s>BECKER: Yes, exactly. And they're not committing fraud. I think in all likelihood, what happened is they moved and election officials had difficult time getting enough data to confirm they had indeed moved so they can remove them from their old state. This is something that millions of Americans experience but is getting much better since 2012. In 2016 and 2017, voter lists are more accurate probably than they've ever been before, thanks to the efforts of a bipartisan group of Republicans and Democrats who have worked to improve the quality of the voter lists and ensure only those eligible can vote.</s>COOPER: So, when President Trump says -- well, if there wasn't voter fraud, why were you doing the study? Your study was actually looking at the multiple registrations, people have died and just the difficulties the voting system has. Is that right?</s>BECKER: That's right. We've been working with election officials for years. We've been facing these problems of keeping up with the mobility of Americans. So, in working with them, we wanted to try to quantify the nature of that problem and do some quality, nonpartisan data driven research to do that. And so, there was a good reason for doing that. In fact, that report led to a lot of positive reforms that happened since then with online voter registration spreading to 33 states plus D.C., to more states sharing data between them to keep voter records up to date and get more voters register on to the list. That report had the impact that we hoped.</s>COOPER: And, David Becker, finally, I mean, when the president of the United States says that you are groveling, I just have to give you a chance to respond to that or I don't even know what it means exactly. But are you groveling?</s>BECKER: Yes, I don't really know what to say. I don't know what to say about that. I certainly didn't ask to have the report cited by any political candidate. My only interest here is that the research that I and many others have done over time is cited accurately. Then we get an accurate picture of what's really going on in our election system and that accurate picture is our election system is remarkably secure and the Republican and Democratic election officials who run it all over the country work very hard to make sure that only those eligible can vote but those who are eligible have an easy time voting. And that's why study after study, from the Bush DOJ, to the Federal Election Assistance Commission, to professors at academic institutions, to Republican and Democratic secretaries of state who investigate this, they've all found there's just a slight amount of voter fraud in the United States.</s>COOPER: All right. David Becker, appreciate your time. Thank you. Let's dig deeper into the investigation itself. How it might work, who would it involve? Our justice correspondent Pamela Brown has more on all that and joins us now. So, who exactly would be in charge of an investigation into Trump's claims of widespread voter fraud?</s>PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Anderson, we've learned from a senior administration official that he is eyeing an executive order on voter fraud or a presidential memorandum. And the expectation would be the Department of Justice would lead the charge. But I've spoken to several officials there who are perplexed and hoping the administration will provide more clarity, because typically for the DOJ and the FBI to open an investigation, there is predication, a specific credible allegation, someone calling in and saying they've heard or specific evidence and as we know, this allegation that there was widespread voter fraud, millions voted illegally, is completely baseless. So, frankly, it would be unprecedented for Department of Justice to lead the charge in an investigation like this. The president has other options. He could appoint a special prosecutor. He could ask a congressional committee to investigate. But as you pointed out earlier, politicians on Capitol Hill are signaling they have no interest in investigating this, Anderson.</s>COOPER: And recently, Trump's own legal team suggested there was no fraud in documents filed with the court. The president, though, is only talking about, focusing on states where he himself didn't really compete, where he didn't visit, California and others, right?</s>BROWN: Right. California, New York. We heard Sean Spicer cite those states today. Those are states that voted overwhelmingly against Donald Trump when you look at the popular vote. And you're right, Don McGahn, Trump's White House counsel, filed a brief back in December saying that there's no evidence the election was tainted by voter fraud. That was in response to Jill Stein's vote recount effort in Michigan. And so, today, Sean Spicer said, we're going broader. We're not looking at those states where it was a close count. We're looking at states like California and New York where, you know, there was a different margin and clearly Hillary Clinton won the popular vote. So, it's yet to be seen how this is all going to play out, Anderson.</s>COOPER: All right. Pam Brown, appreciate it. With us tonight, CNN political analyst, Kirsten Powers, Trump supporter and contributor to "The Hill", Kayleigh McEnany, Republican consultant, Margaret Hoover, and Democratic strategist Jonathan Tasini. Kirsten, it's interesting here, the president -- I mean, I would have no problem with an investigation to, you know, fix problems in the voting system, if there's a lot of dead people on the rolls. If there's people registered in multiple states. That though is not voter fraud, which is the president is alleging is massive 3 million to 5 million people illegally voting. It's a controversy. It would be the biggest voter fraud I think probably in the United States.</s>KIRSTEN POWERS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I think we have to think about what it would take to get people to show up and pretend to be those dead people. I mean, that's what it would have to take. And I think it's confusing to a lot of people who are watching. They do hear dead people on the voter rolls and they think something smells. It doesn't sound right. But you have to understand, but someone then has to get a person to go and pretend to be that person and then it has to happen millions of times, right? And so, I think that, you know, this is -- this is pretty crazy stuff. It really is. And the fact that they're singling out states like California and New York as if it's suspicious that people would vote for a Democrat in those states. I mean, those are Democratic states.</s>COOPER: And President Trump did not really compete in California. He wasn't spending hundreds of millions of dollars, tens of millions of dollars to compete in California which Hillary Clinton clearly was competing in California.</s>POWERS: Yes, exactly. No, I mean, to single it out and for him to say, "I can guarantee it would not be voters for me," I mean, how can he guarantee that? It's crazy.</s>COOPER: Kayleigh?</s>KAYLEIGH MCENANY, TRUMP SUPPORTER: I agree with you that it was not millions of people. I have seen the evidence, Donald Trump claims to have it, I'd like to see that. What I disagree with is those who are calling Donald Trump a liar, how dare he lie about this, when, in fact, it's nearly impossible to prove that he's lying particularly, when we have a peer reviewed study that says 6 percent of the illegal immigrant population said to Congress, a congressional study, "yes, we voted," that would be hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants. I don't think it's beyond the realm of comprehension there are many illegal immigrants who are voting. Scale is what I question. I don't mind him calling the study, but I think he would advantage himself to be prospective, looking forward, how could we clean up the voting rolls, like you mentioned, rather than retrospective calling into question his election and the popular vote.</s>COOPER: Jonathan?</s>JONATHAN TASINI, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: There is no voter fraud. This is complete fantasy. What there is plenty of in the United States is voter suppression and what happens is in many states, particularly Republican governors pass laws to try to prevent people from voting. And, Kirsten, I talked about this before the show, the voting system in this country is deficient. It's messed up. It has nothing to do with fraud. It has to do with people's ability to actually vote, to get access, to have enough voting machines, people's voting rights suppressed in many states. In this state, you may remember during the primary that happened between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, 120,000 votes just disappeared in Brooklyn. That didn't necessarily disadvantage one over the other, but it just showed we have a broken system. In the same way Donald Trump began a conversation about sexual harassment when it came out that he probably sexually assaulted women in multiple instances, I think this is a missed opportunity, because we actually have to have a debate about an election system that is broken.</s>COOPER: Margaret?</s>MARGARET HOOVER, REPUBLICAN CONSULTANT: You know, yes, voter suppression happens. Yes, voter fraud happens around the edges, if we're honest about it. But the idea of scale, right, 3 million to 5 million people actually didn't -- unauthorized people here. I mean, that -- to use Kirsten's words, that's crazy. If we're honest about ourselves, right, what this really is, it's been pretty well-documented Donald Trump has a bee in his bonnet about not having won the popular vote, and he can't let it go, and that's sort of what's shaking around in his mind. And we know that he has a history of really informing himself based on anecdotal experiences rather than really reading books or reading studies or reading papers, because otherwise, he would see there is no evidence for this.</s>COOPER: I feel -- I mean, I don't know if I should say this, but I feel bad for somebody -- I mean, he won an extraordinary victory. What he did was incredible. It was incredible -- the amount of money Hillary Clinton spent, the relatively small amount of money Donald Trump spent. He won an incredible victory. The fact that he doesn't feel that and take joy in that is amazing to me.</s>POWERS: I agree with that, but I'm going to maybe disagree a little of what Margaret said, because on the right, there is this drum beat all the time about voter fraud and they're always claiming, doing these stories, if you listen to right wing media, they're always telling people elections are being stolen and why -- what do we need to do about it. We need to have voter ID and voter ID keeps who from voting? Usually people who vote for Democrats. So, I don't think it's has scattered shot as it seems. And I think that maybe part of it is an ego and is probably agenda-driven.</s>TASINI: And if I can grovel -- go ahead.</s>MCENANY: I do think, look, it's a worthy cause. We have, according to the Pew study, 1 in 8 people on the voting rolls are dead or duplicate --</s>POWERS: But they have the vote, Kayleigh.</s>MCENANY: And when you couple that with a system where you don't have to show ID when you vote and the fact that we've had nearly 700 convictions of voting fraud. You can find on Heritage's website. This is a problem, but it wasn't part of Donald Trump's platform and I think to make it your rallying cry when we can build all the wall and do the things that I think are really important --</s>TASINI: But having dead people on the rolls, having dead people on the rolls is different than voter fraud.</s>COOPER: Hold on. Steve Bannon, Mnuchin, Tiffany Trump have multiple registrations.</s>TASINI: And, Kirsten, if I could do the groveling not to Anderson but to Kirsten -- she made an excellent point. This is a long-standing Republican strategy which is to question voting, say there's all this voter fraud in order to suppress the vote on the part of Democratic leaning voters. This goes back way before Donald Trump.</s>MCENANY: It's not an effort to suppress the vote.</s>TASINI: It is.</s>MCENANY: When you have a presidential election determined by 100 something votes in Florida, having accuracy and fairness and no fraud whatsoever --</s>TASINI: The kind of voting laws passed and the notion that, for example, there aren't enough voting machines in Cleveland, places that are predominantly African-American, these are Republican strategies to reduce the number of Democratic voters.</s>MCENANY: It's not true.</s>TASINI: That's true.</s>POWERS: Kayleigh, I just want to ask you because you're smart and you have goodwill, I really believe that. And you just said the thing about the hundreds of dead people on the rolls. Now, where is the breakdown? Because those hundred people have to go and vote. There has to be a conspiracy to get some people to go in and impersonate dead people and vote. So, where is it you see that happening?</s>MCENANY: We've seen Democratic operatives caught on camera conspiring --</s>POWERS: We're talking about -- to the point you could swing an election.</s>MCENANY: Of course you could swing an election --</s>POWERS: Kayleigh, I don't think any of us would argue that there are people out there that do bad things.</s>MCENANY: Sure.</s>POWERS: But what we're talking about here is, especially what Trump is saying is millions of people. That's a conspiracy of having the names on the rolls, finding out who the dead people are and then going and finding millions of individual Americans to go -- walk into places, pretend to be dead people, and vote. Where is that evidence?</s>MCENANY: We have a Project Veritas video that has caught Democratic operatives on camera trying to do just that. And we have a Florida -- a few hundred votes in Florida determined a presidential election. So, yes, things can happen.</s>POWERS: But that's two or three people at best. I mean, we're not --</s>HOOVER: -- that had been convicted, it is like .0004 percent of the total electorate. When you have 700 people that Heritage has identified and you have 120 million --</s>MCENANY: But do not dispute the fact that in 2000, the election came down to a few hundred votes --</s>HOOVER: But, Kayleigh, that is national. And when you have to go state by state by state, certainly --</s>COOPER: We've got to --</s>HOOVER: The fraction, it is absolutely around the margins.</s>COOPER: We have to --</s>HOOVER: We haven't seen it.</s>TASINI: We have to fix --</s>HOOVER: We haven't seen voter fraud change an election. That is a fact.</s>MCENANY: We have seen an election come down to a few hundred votes.</s>TASINI: I love the Republicans fight about this.</s>COOPER: All right. I don't think we'll solve it tonight. Coming up next, President Trump's order today launching the process of building a wall on the southern border. Mexico's former President Vicente Fox weighs in tonight on this program. On his claim and Donald Trump's claim that his country will reimburse American taxpayers for it. We talked to him a short time ago. He was very candid. We'll play that for you. Also coming up, top of the hour, Van Jones' new town hall with special guest Whoopi Goldberg on the first week of the Trump administration, "THE MESSY TRUTH". It's about 45 minutes from now.