Both House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) and former President Donald Trump are both heavily leaning into the narrative that foreign-born US residents are somehow influencing American elections. But a law enforcement officer who faced hordes of Trump supporters on January 6 isn't buying it.
While standing next to Trump at Mar-a-Lago, Johnson announced Friday that he planned to roll out a legislative proposal to ban non-citizens from voting. During the press conference, the speaker suggested that the Biden administration was encouraging undocumented immigrants to sign up for welfare, and that welfare case workers were registering immigrants to vote, without offering any proof of that happening.
"There are so many millions of illegals in the country that if only one out of 100 voted, they would cast potentially hundreds of thousands of votes in the election," Johnson said.
READ MORE: 'No evidence': Fox host shreds Trump and Mike Johnson's 'null and void' voter fraud claims
During a Friday appearance on MSNBC's All In with Chris Hayes, former DC Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone scoffed at Trump and Johnson's election integrity press conference. Fanone — who was attacked by Trump supporters while he was defending the US Capitol on January 6 — suggested Johnson and Trump were more of a threat to elections than immigrants.
"The irony is not lost on me of Speaker Mike Johnson and Donald Trump giving a press conference on election integrity," Fanone said. "No two people in this country have done more to undermine integrity in our election process than they have. It's laughable."
Non-citizen voting already been illegal since 1996, when Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigration Responsibility Act. That law makes it a crime for non-citizens to vote, punishable by up to a year in prison, along with deportation. And according to the Washington Post, the Heritage Foundation's database of all documented election fraud cases shows just 85 instances of non-citizens voting in elections since 2002, out of more than two billion ballots cast.
Johnson's bill may not even pass his chamber, since the speaker can afford only one defection from his caucus assuming full attendance in the House of Representatives. And even if it did pass, the Democratic-controlled US Senate likely wouldn't even bring it up for a vote.
READ MORE: (Opinion) 'By design': Johnson falsely claims Democrats are trying to turn 'illegals' into voters
The Mar-a-Lago press conference came as Johnson is fighting to hold onto the speakership, amid a threat from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia). Greene threatened to bring a motion to vacate Johnson in the event he works with Democrats to pass additional funding for Ukraine. She previously threatened to oust Johnson for passing a $1.2 trillion government funding bill on the eve of a shutdown deadline.
Watch Fanone's comments below, or by clicking this link.
