The US House of Representatives passed the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act on a largely party line vote.
The vote count was 220 to 208, with four only Democrats voting for the bill and zero Republicans opposing it. Democrats who voted for the bill were Jared Golden (Maine), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Wash.), Henry Cuellar (Texas) and Ed Case (Hawaii).
Congressman Bryon Donalds (R-Florida), and candidate for Governor of Florida, said on X, “If you are not a US citizen, then you SHOULD NOT be voting in US elections. It's that simple. I'm proud to have championed and co-sponsored "The SAVE Act" last Congress and this Congress.”
The SAVE Act has simple, common sense goals. It requires voters to provide proof of citizenship in person to register for a federal election and it requires that noncitizens be removed from voter rolls.
“A common sense law that was long overdue,” says New York State Conservative Chairman Gerry Kassar.
The SAVE Act’s future in the Senate is far from secure. In the Senate, 60 votes will be needed to pass to the floor for a vote. Democrat Senators in vulnerable or close districts may peel off and vote for the SAVE Act, but time will tell if enough will do so to pass the law.
Legislation aimed at making American elections secure at all levels is wildly popular across the country. Americans support by wide margins requiring photo identification to vote (84%) and providing proof of citizenship when registering to vote for the first time (83%) according to a November 2024 Gallup Poll.
Joe Burns, election law expert and partner at Holtzman Vogel said, “It’s hardly controversial. Congress has this authority over federal elections under Ar. I, Sec. 4 of the US Constitution. This is a power that Congress has exercised a number of times in recent decades.”
Gallup reported that Americans “broadly support measures to limit fraud and ensure election integrity, including requiring photo identification to vote and providing proof of citizenship when first registering to vote.”
Burns added, “The Democratic members who today are complaining that Congress has overstepped its authority forget that they were the ones who championed the National Voter Registration Act in 1993. Almost ten years later, large bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress approved the Help America Vote Act. Not long after HAVA became law, Congress, with bipartisan majorities, approved the Military and Overseas Voters Act. The SAVE Act follow this tradition of Congress exercising its constitutional authority over federal elections.”
Democrats make claims that non-citizens voting is so rare, and that penalties are severe if you do, that it is not an issue. Other Democrats make claim that there is a war on women voters and that SAVE prevents married women from voting. Republicans say that any non-citizen voting is an issue and with over ten million new illegal aliens let into the country under President Biden, on top of those already here, the likelihood that a n