Right-wing media, and Fox News in particular, love embellishing the terrifying specter of voter fraud as a way to support and justify restrictive voter identification and registration laws. It's hardly surprising -- the more restrictive the law, the fewer people vote; and when fewer people vote, more Republicans win elections. Unfortunately for the fear-mongers, study after study shows that cases of voter fraud are few and far between and fears of a massive-scale voter fraud effort are unfounded.

Surprisingly, Fox News' Megyn Kelly now agrees. In a segment on voter fraud on the November 4 edition of America Live, Kelly admitted that the problem is “not overwhelming.”

KELLY: Well that's the classic debate. Because Democrats always say it's about disenfranchising, the Republicans always say it's about voter fraud. And you guys are never going to see eye to eye.



ALAN COLMES: We don't have enough cases of fraud to make this a real issue. It's an invented issue.



KELLY: Well, but there have been some instances, but you're right it's not overwhelming.

Kelly's reality-based opinion about the state of voter fraud in the country is entirely inconsistent with her network's feverish, obsessive coverage of the issue. Before practically every election, Fox breathlessly warns of potential fraud; every vote is constantly in peril of being stolen. The network has even gone so far as to establish a voter fraud hotline:

Why would Fox News devote such resources to a problem that is “not overwhelming”? Because Fox is a GOP mouthpiece and the party benefits from driving their voters into a frenzy about supposed fraud and passing laws to suppress the vote.