Stop the SAVE Act

Trump Has Pushed for a Vote in the House This Week On A Bill That May Disenfranchise Tens of Millions of Eligible Voters

This will be a short one. No, I am not writing about the vile, racist image posted on Trump’s Truth Social account last week. It has Donald Trump’s decade-long drumbeat of racism from the White House for me to fully embrace at long last the great Toni Morrison’s brilliant admonition that “the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work.”

And yes, I loved Bad Bunny’s performance at the Superbowl. It was spiritually restorative, musically exciting, visually stunning, and just what this country needed. To quote Toni Morrison again, “this is precisely the time when artists go to work.” Bad Bunny went to work!

But we have some urgent work to do this week. And what is the work? Trump’s obsession last week and today is “voter fraud.” In fact voter fraud was the subject of the Truth Social post that ended with Trump’s grotesquely racist meme. Yes I know, Trump always talks about voter fraud. But this time his focus is on moving Republicans in Congress to pass the SAVE Act.

What is the SAVE Act? It is a “proof of citizenship” mandate for voter registration, and is one leg of the three-legged stool Trump is employing to try and manipulate a win for Republicans in this November’s congressional elections (the other two are ICE intimidation and mid-decade redistricting).

I’ve learned that the House is likely to vote on the SAVE Act THIS WEDNESDAY.

By now you likely know that there is no serious “voter fraud” problem in this country. This has has been proven in numerous studies time and time again. Yet claims of fraud remain a Republican canard. The SAVE Act is a voter suppression law cloaked in anti- voter fraud language.

If passed, it is estimated that the SAVE Act law will disenfranchise over 20 million voters. Why? Because the ID required by this law is not just your driver’s license. The SAVE Act will require voters to show proof of CITIZENSHIP in order to register to vote in federal elections. That means that voters will need to have in hand a birth certificate or a passport. Mail-in registration would require in-person proof of citizenship.

It is estimated that just only half of Americans hold a valid U.S. passport. The states in which less than 40% of its citizens hold a U.S. passport include Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Ohio, Michigan, and a dozen others.

Birth certificates are also problematic for many Americans. Some older Americans in rural areas were born at home or by mid-wives and were never issued a birth certificate. Others are unable to locate one because of fire, theft, or loss.

Married women are particularly vulnerable here, because a married woman’s name when she seeks to register, may be different than the name on her birth certficate.

Earlier versions of the bill were even worse. One would have require proof of citizenship - either a passport or birth certificate - at the polling place in order to cast a ballot.

But there’s more. As the Brennan Center for Justice explains, “the [House] bill would require photo ID to vote at the polls, providing a narrow list of acceptable IDs more restrictive that the voter ID laws in every state but Ohio.” The bill would no longer permit the use of most tribal IDs to vote and would require that states conduct voter purges every 30 days. Frequent purges of the voter rolls, routinely result in the removal of legitimate voters from the rolls as well. Of course those who are deceased or who are no longer state residents should be removed from voting lists. But purges are often conducted to purge “inactive voters” - those who have chosen not to vote in recent elections.

This defeats the very purpose of mobilizing disaffected, non-participating citizens to vote. Imagine someone who registered to vote and voted fifteen years ago, but has chosen to sit out elections for the past decade. They live in the same home. Fearing that this year our very democracy is in peril, this citizen decides several days before Election Day that this year they will vote. Voter purges for “inactivity” would make such late-motivated voting for registered voters impossible.

Every one of the restrictive measures in the SAVE Act has been on the Republican voter suppression wish-list for more than a decade.

Trump spoke repeatedly about the need to pass the SAVE Act last week and on Monday, setting it as a priority for Republicans in Congress this week. It is part of his desire to “nationalize elections.”

So you know what you have to do. In every state, get on the horn asap to your Representatives and Senators and let them know your views on the SAVE Act. Visit their district offices and demand a meeting with staff. Tag your Representatives on social media. Make your position clear.

Call your Representatives and Senators at 202-224-3121. We have work to do!