(AFP) – The Republican-led US House of Representatives passed a bill Thursday that would add proof-of-citizenship requirements to voter registration, in a vote designed to mobilize supporters concerned about election security that has little chance of becoming law. The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act is backed by President Donald Trump, who dominates the House Republicans and continues to claim falsely that he was cheated by voter fraud in the 2020 election.
“This bill is very, very simple. It ensures that only American citizens can vote in our federal elections. It isn’t hard,” said Florida Republican Kat Cammack ahead of the bill’s passage. “Eighty-seven percent of Americans believe only Americans should vote in our elections.”
But it has little hope of making it through the Senate, where the 60-vote threshold for passing legislation means the 53-47 Republican majority requires cooperation from the opposition. With the campaign for 2026 midterm elections fast approaching, Democrats say the bill is merely an attempt to lend a patina of credibility to bogus claims of voter fraud. Worried about millions of eligible voters being blocked from voter rolls or otherwise deterred, the party opposes the SAVE Act, noting that noncitizen voting is already illegal and that it almost never happens.
Trump — who has claimed for years that US elections are rife with illicit voting by foreigners — urged Republicans to shut down the government over the issue last year. But they rebuffed the president, removing the 2024 incarnation of the SAVE Act from a larger government funding bill.
The legislation would require all Americans to prove their citizenship status by presenting documentation in person when registering to vote or updating their voter registration information. Opponents say more than 140 million American citizens do not possess a passport and as many as 69 million women who have taken their spouse’s name do not have a birth certificate matching their legal name.
The Center for American Progress said the bill would prevent Americans from being able to register to vote by mail, end voter registration drives nationwide, and eliminate online voter registration. The Brennan Center for Justice, a liberal public policy institute, says just 4.4 million voters registered at an elections or registrar’s office in the two years leading up to the 2022 midterms.
“There’s a direct relationship between the ease of registration and the number of voters on the rolls,” the organization said in analysis of the SAVE Act. “Some American citizens — even those who can access citizenship documents — will not register, and will not turn out to vote, if they can’t register online or by mail.”
© 2024 AFP
