As I've noted before, voting integrity better in this election than ever before. Zero evidence of fraud.https://nyti.ms/2jSCnuX ||||| The Post's Michelle Ye Hee Lee explains why White House press secretary Sean Spicer's claims on Jan. 24 about voter fraud in the presidential election don't add up. (Bastien Inzaurralde/The Washington Post) 
 
 “I think there have been studies; there was one that came out of Pew in 2008 that showed 14 percent of people who have voted were not citizens. There are other studies that were presented to him.” 
 
 –White House press secretary Sean Spicer, news briefing, Jan. 24, 2017 
 
 Spicer cited repeatedly debunked research to support Trump’s claim that millions of people voted illegally during the 2016 presidential election. These studies do not support Trump’s Four-Pinocchio claims of “millions” of people voting illegally — as we’ve covered here, here, here, here and here. 
 
 Spicer claimed Trump believes there was widespread voter fraud, based on studies that were presented to him. Then Spicer cited a Pew study that — as we noted before — does not support this claim. Moreover, Spicer conflated the Pew study with another study that — again — does not support this claim. 
 
 A 2012 Pew Center on the States study found problems with inaccurate voter registrations, people who registered in more than one state (which could happen if the voter moves and registers in the new state without telling the former state) and deceased voters whose information was still on the voter rolls. 
 
 The primary author of the Pew report tweeted in response to Trump’s staff’s claim that he “can confirm that report made no findings re: voter fraud.” 
 
 We found millions of out of date registration records due to people moving or dying, but found no evidence that voter fraud resulted. — David Becker (@beckerdavidj) November 28, 2016 
 
 Spicer said a Pew study from 2008 showed that “14 percent of people who have voted were not citizens.” He likely was referring to research by Old Dominion University professors, using data from 2008 and 2010. They found that 14 percent of noncitizens in the 2008 and 2010 samples said they were registered to vote. 
 
 But the researchers warned that “it is impossible to tell for certain whether the noncitizens who responded to the survey were representative of the broader population of noncitizens.” 
 
 One of the researchers, Jesse Richman, wrote about the Trump staff’s use of his research. The results “suggest that almost all elections in the US are not determined by noncitizen participation, with occasional and very rare potential exceptions,” he wrote. 
 
 Despite Trump’s repeated claims, his attorneys stated there was no evidence of voter fraud in the 2016 election. In a court filing opposing Green Party candidate Jill Stein’s recount petition, lawyers for Trump and his campaign wrote: “All available evidence suggests that the 2016 general election was not tainted by fraud or mistake.” 
 
 When we debunked this claim on Nov. 29, 2016, we implored Trump’s staff members to please drop this talking point — as we are tired of telling them it is false. We can’t emphasize this point enough. 
 
 The Fact Checker Recidivism Watch tracks politicians who repeat claims that we have previously found to be incorrect or false. These posts are short summaries of previous findings, with links to the original fact-check. We welcome reader suggestions. 
 
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 You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| Mr. Trump and his aides repeatedly suggested during the transition period that “irregularities” contributed to his popular-vote loss by nearly 3 million ballots to Hillary Clinton. Mr. Trump won the Electoral College, but his 2-percentage-point popular vote loss to Mrs. Clinton was the largest for a winning presidential candidate since the disputed election of 1876. 
 
 Democrats and some Republicans have pointed to that margin to claim that Mr. Trump is an illegitimate president. Such assertions have rankled Mr. Trump deeply. 
 
 A November 2016 blog post on Infowars, the conspiracy theory-focused website run by radio host Alex Jones, posited the idea that roughly 3 million people voted illegally. Mr. Jones has hosted Mr. Trump on his radio show in the past. 
 
 The assertion was based on tweets from a self-proclaimed voter expert, who claimed to have a study. However, there’s no evidence of the study. And officials in swing states where Mr. Trump secured victory, many of which are governed by Republicans, say that there is no evidence of such fraud. 
 
 Mr. Spicer also made vague reference to another Pew Research Center study that supposedly backed up Mr. Trump, but the author of the study in question, David Becker, now executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, tweeted again that no such fraud happened. 
 
 When a reporter pointed out to Mr. Spicer that such widespread fraud would be one of the biggest scandals in American electoral history and asked why the administration isn’t investigating, the press secretary said, “Maybe we will.” 
 
 Mr. Spicer, who worked at the Republican National Committee before working for Mr. Trump, declined to say whether he personally believes this claim. 
 
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 “What does it mean for democracy?” a reporter asked about Mr. Trump’s belief. 
 
 “It means that I’ve answered your question,” Mr. Spicer said. 
 
 Gag orders, schmag orders 
 
 With reports proliferating about executive branch agencies under gag orders, Mr. Spicer told reporters that the White House is “looking into it,” though he didn’t exactly deny it. 
 
 “I don’t think it’s any surprise that when there’s an administration turnover, that we’re going to review the policies,” he said. 
 
 It started when the National Park Service retweeted crowd shots this weekend attesting to a smaller audience for President Trump’s inauguration than for Barack Obama’s first in 2009. 
 
 That prompted a blackout, then an apology, then lots of pretty pictures. 
 
 “They had inappropriately violated their own social media policies,” Mr. Spicer said. “There was guidance that was put out to the department to act in compliance with the rules that were set forth.” 
 
 Well, looks like Badlands National Park has gone rogue. 
 
 Update: Badlands National Park tweets are gone. 
 
 But it looks like whack-a-mole out there. 
 
 Poor man wanna be rich. 
 
 Rich man wanna be king. 
 
 And a king ain’t satisfied, 
 
 Till he rules everything. 
 
 “Badlands,” Bruce Springsteen 
 
 Democrats offer a trillion-dollar infrastructure plan 
 
 Daring Mr. Trump to make good on his grand infrastructure promises, Senate Democrats on Tuesday will unveil a trillion-dollar plan to rebuild the nation’s roads, railways, airports, waterways and sewer systems over 10 years. 
 
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 “From our largest cities to our smallest towns, communities across the country are struggling to meet the challenges of aging infrastructure,” Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, will say. “Our urban and rural communities have their own unique set of infrastructure priorities, and this proposal would provide funding to address those needed upgrades that go beyond the traditional road and bridge repair.” 
 
 Republicans resisted President Barack Obama’s push for an infrastructure “surge” for eight years, arguing that the federal government couldn’t afford it and that state and local governments should shoulder more responsibility for improvements. But Mr. Trump has taken up the Democratic cause. 
 
 “We will build new roads, and highways, and bridges, and airports, and tunnels, and railways all across our wonderful nation,” he vowed in his Inaugural Address. 
 
 The plan dedicates $180 billion to rail and bus systems, $65 billion to ports, airports and waterways, $110 billion for water and sewer systems, $100 billion for energy infrastructure, and $20 billion for public and tribal lands. 
 
 “We’re asking President Trump to work with us to make it a reality,” Mr. Schumer will say. 
 
 The next fight: a Supreme Court nominee 
 
 Next up from the Trump White House news fire hose: a nominee for the Supreme Court. 
 
 President Trump has invited Senators Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, and Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, as well as both the chairman and ranking Democrat of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to the White House at 3 p.m. Tuesday to discuss the nearly year-old vacancy on the Supreme Court. 
 
 The president said a nomination would be announced next week. 
 
 “We will pick a totally great Supreme Court justice,” Mr. Trump told reporters at the end of an event where he signed executive actions. 
 
 Mr. McConnell, on the Senate floor Tuesday, said, “I appreciate the president soliciting our advice on this important matter.” 
 
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 Mr. McConnell blocked consideration of any nominee to replace Justice Antonin Scalia, who died last February, during the final year of President Obama’s term. 
 
 New intelligence website to track Trump’s potential conflicts of interest 
 
 Former intelligence officers and national security officials have formed a new national security political action committee, called 4DPac (Democracy Development Diplomacy Defense), to publish what they call no-spin research on Mr. Trump’s foreign investments. 
 
 Their concern: that the president’s business dealings could clash with the nation’s national security interests. Their first targets: India and Turkey, with many more to come. 
 
 Trump still tweeting on personal account 
 
 White House aides have been trying to nudge the president to ditch his personal Twitter account and use the official @POTUS handle. After all, presidential communications are supposed to be archived and preserved under specific rules. Think Hillary Clinton’s private server, not something Mr. Trump appeared to approve of during the campaign. 
 
 It’s not working. 
 
 He started the day with: 
 
 He continued with: 
 
 (That one has the peculiarity of misstating the date of Mr. Trump’s inauguration.) 
 
 And he has kept going. 
 
 #MAGA! 
 
 A fun weekend in Philadelphia 
 
 House and Senate Republicans decamp from Washington on Thursday for their annual retreat — this time in Philadelphia. And House Speaker Paul D. Ryan made it official: President Trump will be the guest of honor. 
 
 Government ethicist to Trump: Let me help you 
 
 Despite a rocky start to their relationship, Walter M. Shaub Jr., the head of the Office of Government Ethics, is apparently still “willing and ready” to help Mr. Trump handle his potential conflicts of interest. 
 
 Mr. Shaub met with members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in a closed-door session on Monday afternoon at the request of the chairman of the panel, Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah. After Mr. Shaub publicly criticized Mr. Trump’s plans this month, Mr. Chaffetz accused him of playing politics — prompting Democrats and other watchdogs to come to the ethics monitor’s defense. 
 
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 According to a recap of Monday’s meeting by Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, the top Democrat on the committee, Mr. Shaub said that his office had not received copies of documents that Mr. Trump referenced at a news conference on Jan. 11, and that it had been provided with no new information. Still, Mr. Shaub said he would help the president, if called upon. 
 
 There were about nine members of the committee at the meeting — eight Democrats and Mr. Chaffetz, according to his spokeswoman, M.J. Henshaw. 
 
 After Mr. Chaffetz left the meeting with Mr. Shaub, he told reporters: “I think we understand each other better.” 
 
 The building trade unions love Trump 
 
 Big Labor may have been With Her, but the unions that represent builders and pavers Love Him. 
 
 “We have a common bond with the president,” said Sean McGarvey, the president of North America’s Building Trades Unions, after meeting on Monday with Mr. Trump and hearing him promise a major push to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure. “We come from the same industry. He understands the value of driving development, moving people to the middle class.” 
 
 If the labor movement divides over Mr. Trump, it would not be the first time. An old saying holds that the building trades would pave over their mothers’ graves if it created jobs. And before Mr. Trump’s rise, unions like the Communications Workers of America and the Service Employees International Union had split with the building unions over the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipelines, with the former siding with liberal environmentalists and the latter seeing opportunities for work. 
 
 In this case, the unions may unite with Democrats behind the new president — leaving Republican spending hawks in the cold. 
 
 Defense secretary seeks to reassure NATO chief 
 
 On his first working day as the country’s new secretary of defense, James N. Mattis spoke with the head of NATO and told him that the United States depends on it and on Europe for trans-Atlantic security. 
 
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 The telephone conversation came just a week after Mr. Mattis’s boss, Mr. Trump, called NATO “obsolete,” because, Mr. Trump said, the alliance hasn’t done enough to combat terrorism. 
 
 Mr. Mattis “wanted to place the call on his first full day in office to reinforce the importance he places on the alliance,” a Pentagon spokesman, Capt. Jeff Davis, said in a statement on Monday night. ||||| Washington (CNN) President Donald Trump believes millions of votes were cast illegally in last year's election, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said on Tuesday, but he wouldn't provide any concrete evidence for the claim, which has long been debunked. 
 
 "The President does believe that, I think he's stated that before, and stated his concern of voter fraud and people voting illegally during the campaign and continues to maintain that belief based on studies and evidence people have brought to him," Spicer said. 
 
 Pressed for what evidence exists, Spicer would say only that Trump "has believed that for a while based on studies and information he has." 
 
 When pushed about whether Trump will call for an investigation into the voter fraud, Spicer said, "maybe we will." 
 
 Trump surprised the top Republicans and Democrats in Congress on Monday when, during a dinner at the White House, he repeated his claim that millions of undocumented immigrants voted for Hillary Clinton -- allegedly depriving him of the popular vote, according to two sources familiar with the meeting. 
 
 Trump lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by nearly 3 million votes in November, but won the Electoral College and thus the presidency. Trump, however, has seemingly been fixated on the popular vote, tweeting after the election in November that, "In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally." 
 
 A number of studies have found no evidence of widespread voter fraud. 
 
 The Truth About Voter Fraud, a report written by experts at The Brennan Center for Justice, found voter fraud rates were between 0.00004% and 0.0009%. 
 
 "Given this tiny incident rate for voter impersonation fraud, it is more likely that an American will be struck by lightning than that he will impersonate another voter at the polls," reads the report. 
 
 Trump's lawyers -- in an objection to Green Party candidate Jill Stein's Michigan recount petition -- have also argued that there was no evidence voter fraud in the 2016 election. 
 
 "All available evidence suggests that the 2016 general election was not tainted by fraud or mistake," the lawyers wrote in a filing. 
 
 South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham slammed Trump earlier Tuesday over the claim. 
 
 "I wasn't there, but if the President of the United States is claiming that 3.5 million people voted illegally, that shakes confidence in our democracy — he needs to disclose why he believes that," Graham told CNN. 
 
 JUST WATCHED Trump renews false claim of illegal ballots Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Trump renews false claim of illegal ballots 03:04 
 
 Spicer said Tuesday that Trump believes in widespread voter fraud, in part, because of a study that found 14% of people who voted were non-citizens. 
 
 Spicer did not say expressly which study Trump has read, but a 2014 study by Jesse Richman and David Earnest found more than 14% of non-citizens in 2008 and 2010 "indicated that they were registered to vote." 
 
 The authors wrote, in a Washington Post opinion piece, the report showed "that 6.4 percent of non-citizens voted in 2008 and 2.2 percent of non-citizens voted in 2010." 
 
 The study was designed by Cooperative Congressional Election Study, and in 2014 the group said their sample was so small that it could be incorrect and attributable to normal survey error and not non-citizens saying that they are registered to vote. 
 
 Trump's campaign cited in October a 2012 study from the Pew Charitable Trusts entitled "Inaccurate, Costly and Inefficient: Evidence that American Voter Registration Systems Needs an Upgrade" as backup for that claim. The study found that "about 24 million voter registrations are no longer valid or are significantly inaccurate" and "more than 1.8 million dead people are listed as voters." 
 
 The study, which is based on 2011 data, is about the need to update voter rolls and underscores deficiencies in the voter registration system, but does not show that people who have registrations in two states are voting twice for Democrats or for Republicans. 
 
 We found millions of out of date registration records due to people moving or dying, but found no evidence that voter fraud resulted. — David Becker (@beckerdavidj) November 28, 2016 
 
 David Becker, the primary author of the Pew Report, tweeted in November, "We found millions of out of date registration records due to people moving or dying, but found no evidence that voter fraud resulted." ||||| Tweet with a location 
 
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– President Trump isn't just doubling down on his claims that voter fraud cost him the popular vote, he says he plans to call for an investigation. In two tweets Wednesday morning, Trump wrote: "I will be asking for a major investigation into VOTER FRAUD, including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and...even, those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time). Depending on results, we will strengthen up voting procedures!" Earlier this week, the president repeated his claim that 3 million to 5 million "illegals" voted, and he says that's the only reason Hillary Clinton beat him in the popular vote by about 3 million ballots. On Tuesday, White House press secretary Sean Spicer backed up his boss. Trump "has believed that for a while based on studies and information he has," said Spicer, per CNN. The problem is that no news service can find any such studies. The New York Times notes that a post on the discredited InfoWars website made the claim about millions of fraudulent voters in November, and Trump has appeared on the show with host Alex Jones. Spicer did reference a Pew study, but that study's own author says there's "zero evidence" of fraud in the 2016 vote. The Washington Post fact checker blog digs into the particulars and remains unswayed: "Spicer cited repeatedly debunked research," it says, adding that "these studies do not support Trump’s Four-Pinocchio claims of 'millions' of people voting illegally."