Washington, May 11 (EFE).- President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order creating an advisory commission on the “integrity” of the US electoral system, which will investigate – among other things – his as yet unsupported claims about massive voter fraud in the November presidential election.
The Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity will be headed by Vice President Mike Pence and is expected to present its conclusive report sometime next year, according to what White House Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said at her daily press briefing on Thursday.
There was no formal ceremony staged for the signing of the order, the text of which has yet to be announced by the White House.
Afterwards, Trump posted a photograph on his Twitter account showing him signing the order in the Oval Office accompanied by Pence.
After defeating Hillary Clinton in last year’s election in the Electoral College, although the Democrat received some three million more votes than Trump, the president has claimed on several occasions that massive election fraud was committed.
The president declared in January that between three and five million undocumented immigrants voted in the November election and that was the reason that the former secretary of state appeared to have handily won the popular vote.
He said at the time on Twitter that he would call for an investigation into election fraud, including identifying people registered in two states, illegal migrants who may have voted and deceased – but still registered – voters in whose names ballots were cast.
Neither Trump nor the White House has ever offered any evidence at all to back up the mogul’s assertions, which experts consider to be completely unfounded.
Serving on the commission along with Pence will be Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, a proponent of stricter voter identification laws.
The deputy press secretary said that the “bipartisan” commission will review the policies and practices surrounding federal elections and will later present a report on the “vulnerabilities” of the system.
Top Democratic leaders reacted with suspicion to the creation of the commission ostensibly designed to protect the “integrity” of the electoral system.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said that at times complaints of electoral fraud have been used as a “pretext” to deny voting rights to working families and to certain communities such as African Americans and Hispanics.
Former Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders said that “The sole purpose of this commission is to propagate a myth and to give encouragement to Republican governors and state legislators to increase voter suppression.”