WASHINGTON — President Trump on Sunday reiterated his concerns about voter irregularities in the presidential election and said Vice President Mike Pence will lead a commission to investigate voter registration issues.
Shortly after taking office, Trump told congressional lawmakers that 3 to 5 million illegal votes had cost him the popular vote against Hillary Clinton but presented no evidence.
Recently, the White House has played down talk of an investigation, but in an interview with Bill O'Reilly of Fox News before the Super Bowl, Trump said he planned to task his vice president with looking into the concerns.
‘‘I'm going to set up a commission . . . and we’re going to look at it very, very carefully,’’ Trump said.
Despite no credible evidence that any massive voter fraud occurred, especially on the scale Trump suggested, during the 2016 presidential race, the president has continued to push the theory, much to the chagrin of some of his aides and many congressional leaders.
His press secretary promised an investigation into the issue, although a rumored executive order to launch an inquiry has so far been postponed.
On Sunday, O'Reilly pressed Trump on his penchant for making dubious claims without having ‘‘the data to back it up,’’ and the president seemed to narrow his focus from large-scale voter fraud to irregularities with voter registration.
‘‘It has to do with the registration, and when you look at the registration and you see dead people that have voted,’’ Trump said. ‘‘When you see people that are registered in two states, that have voted in two states, when you see other things, when you see illegals, people that are not citizens, and they are on the registration roles.’’
Indeed, it can be common for voters to be on the rolls in multiple states, something Trump has cited as evidence of intentional voter fraud.
The Washington Post has found at least five Trump family members or top administration appointees who were registered in two states during the 2016 election, including Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, and Stephen Bannon, his chief strategist.
‘‘Look, Bill, we can be babies, but you take a look at the registration, you have illegals, you have dead people, you have this, it’s really a bad situation, it’s really bad,’’ Trump concluded.
O’Reilly asked Trump to back up his claims that some 3 million to 5 million illegal votes were cast in the election.
Trump didn’t answer directly, but asserted that immigrants in the US illegally and dead people are on the voter rolls. ‘‘It’s a really a bad situation, it’s really bad,’’ Trump said.
There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the Nov. 8 election. Trump won the Electoral College vote but lost the popular vote by nearly 2.9 million votes to Clinton.
In a separate interview Sunday, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said he saw no role for the federal government because states historically have handled voter fraud investigations.
‘‘There’s no evidence that it occurred in such a significant number that would have changed the presidential election, and I don’t think we ought to spend any federal money investigating that,’’ McConnell told CNN. ‘‘I think the states can take a look at this issue.’’
In addition to being challenged over its handling of facts, the Trump administration has been criticized for issuing executive orders that some believe interfere with the nation’s system of checks and balances.
The legal battle over Trump’s executive order on immigration and refugees is a surprisingly early demonstration of the legal and political risks in a go-it-alone strategy.
President Barack Obama was confronted with that reality late in his tenure when, thwarted by the GOP-controlled House, he used what he called a ‘‘pen and phone’’ strategy to advance his agenda.
He ultimately found one of his most sweeping actions, the expansion of a program deferring deportation for some immigrants, blocked by the courts, while Republicans blasted him for what they said was an abuse of power.
Republicans have been notably quiet as Trump has taken a similar approach, particularly taking advantage of the precedent giving the president broad leeway when it comes to immigration.
A federal judge’s order in Seattle on Friday evening blocking Trump’s ban on admitting travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries showed the limits of the president’s powers and the role of checks and balances among the three branches of government.
The president has also signed a blitz of actions on border security, health care, and financial regulation, showing few signs of slowing down.
On Friday, Trump’s administration imposed sanctions on companies and individuals in response to Iran’s recent ballistic missile test — after months of bitter criticism of Obama’s landmark nuclear deal with Tehran.
Since Inauguration Day, Trump has signed 20 memoranda and executive orders. That number is in line with Obama’s first two weeks.
The executive actions on immigration have led to lawsuits.