Trump May Believe in Voter Fraud Because a Golfer Told Him a Story About Latinos Voting

You’re welcome, America. Photo: Chris Condon/US PGA TOUR

Welcome to 2017: The president of the United States is claiming, with no evidence, that millions of people voted illegally, and that is not the weirdest part of the story.

A report from the New York Times sheds some light on what happened during a White House meeting on Monday, where President Trump told congressional leaders that he believes he lost the popular vote because 3 to 5 million people voted illegally. When one of the Democrats said that claim had been debunked, Trump reportedly cited a story from “the very famous golfer, Bernhard Langer.” Per the Times:

The witnesses described the story this way: Mr. Langer, a 59-year-old native of Bavaria, Germany — a winner of the Masters twice and of more than 100 events on major professional golf tours around the world — was standing in line at a polling place near his home in Florida on Election Day, the president explained, when an official informed Mr. Langer he would not be able to vote.

Ahead of and behind Mr. Langer were voters who did not look as if they should be allowed to vote, Mr. Trump said, according to the staff members — but they were nonetheless permitted to cast provisional ballots. The president threw out the names of Latin American countries that the voters might have come from.

That’s the way three witnesses described the story, but a White House official said Langer was actually relaying a story about a friend who tried to vote in Florida.

When reached by the Times, Langer’s daughter Christina noted that he can’t vote, as he’s a German citizen, adding, “He is not a friend of President Trump’s, and I don’t know why he would talk about him.”

Langer might not want to chat, but we know one person whose phone will be ringing off the hook today, now that everyone thinks he might launch a federal investigation if they tell him the right racist anecdote.

Trump May Believe in Voter Fraud Due to a Golfer’s Anecdote