‘Glaringly empty’

An elections panel rightly goes out of business

The Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, created after the 2016 election to investigate the supposed rash of illegal voting, is no more, and that’s a good thing.

At the time of its creation, newly elected President Donald Trump provided no evidence for his claim that 3 million to 5 million people voted illegally. The president ventured that hypothesis to explain why his opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton, had won the popular vote, even though he won the vote in the Electoral College.

The commission was headed by Vice President Mike Pence and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach.

The commission dissolved into farce as secretaries of state around the country objected to the commission’s request for personal information about voters.

Ohio Republican Secretary of State Jon Husted correctly refused to send voters’ drivers’ license and partial Social Security numbers. The information he did send included reports of voter fraud investigations conducted in Ohio after the 2012, 2014 and 2016 elections. The reviews identified 820 irregularities in years when a combined 14.4 million general-election votes were cast.

Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap, who sat on the commission and has reviewed its findings and documents, has said that the panel’s evidence of voter fraud is “glaringly empty.”

Mr. Dunlap says Mr. Kobach presented no evidence for his claims of double voting and that the report claiming over 1,000 convictions for various forms of voter misconduct went back to 1948, not 2000.

With pushback from secretaries of state of both parties, the commission folded its tent after two meetings. Good riddance.