Hannity's Interview With Kris Kobach Proves Election Commission Is About Voter Suppression

Written by Media Matters Staff

Published

Sean Hannity’s interview with Kris Kobach, who was chosen as vice chair on President Donald Trump’s commission on “election integrity,” was filled with myths about voter fraud, voter intimidation, and undocumented immigrants, confirming that the entire commission is really about finding ways to suppress voter access.

On May 11, Trump signed an executive order establishing a bipartisan “Presidential Commission on Election Integrity” tasked with investigating alleged voter fraud in the voting system. It was announced that Vice President Mike Pence and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach will serve as chair and vice chair of the commission. Kobach has a history of extremism, ties to white supremacists, and promotion of misinformation on immigration and voting issues. During a May 11 an interview on Sean Hannity’s radio program, Kobach promoted multiple debunked myths about the issue of voter fraud, including the racist, bogus story about ‘voter intimidation’ at a polling place in Philadelphia.

SEAN HANNITY (HOST): So tell us about the executive order that establishes the presidential advisory commission on election integrity.

KRIS KOBACH: So what this order does is something that’s never really been done before and that is establishing national nationwide entity to collect data on the issue of voter fraud and election integrity. I have seen examples and many cases of voter fraud in Kansas and that’s one of the reasons we adopted photo ID laws and proof of citizenship laws. You know, I only see what’s in my state, and other secretaries of state and election officials only see what’s in their state and this commission will gather data on a nationwide level and present facts to inform the debate and inform the public of how big this problem is, what the numbers are and people can draw their conclusions and we’ll go where the facts lead us.

HANNITY: OK, but this goes back to many elections, I mean remember the case in Philly at the polling place and you’ve got guys with batons and whatever came of that? Nothing.

KOBACH: Yeah. That was an voter intimidation case and the Bush justice department started the process of prosecuting it and as you’re well aware the Obama justice department dropped the case when they came in.

[...]

KOBACH: We’re going to be looking at the hard facts of the cases. For example, one thing that’s never been done before, and we have asked, in Kansas we asked the Obama administration can we please bounce our voter rolls against the list of known aliens in the United States. The federal government knows of millions of legally present aliens who have green cards and temporary visas. We’ve never been given any access to that information to see how many of those people happened to be registered in Kansas or happen to be registered in you name the state. And for the first time, we’ll be able to do that and we’ll have some hard numbers.

Related:

State Election Officials Throw Cold Water On Conservative Voter Fraud Fears

CNN: Trump Finally To Launch Voter Fraud Panel

Previously:

GOP Strategist: Trump Is Using Voter Fraud Commission To “Confirm His Conspiracy Theories”

Voter Fraud Myths Pushed By Trump Have Long Been Propagated By Right-Wing Media

CNN: Fake News Trolls Pushing Conspiracy Theories “Tweet Right At President Trump” Hoping That He “Cites It Publicly”