Washington, D.C. — Today, the House voted to pass the SAVE America Act, which would require Americans to show proof of their citizenship—for the vast majority, a passport or birth certificate—in order to vote, potentially blocking millions of citizens from casting their ballots.
In response, Gréta Bedekovics, director of Democracy Policy at the Center for American Progress, issued the following statement:
This administration and its supporters in Congress want to silence American citizens in the streets and at the ballot box. That is why they have made this aggressive renewed push, supported by President Trump and Elon Musk, to pass the SAVE Act.
At a moment when the administration is escalating its attacks on democracy and manipulating elections out in the open, congressional Republicans voted to make it significantly harder for millions of citizens to hold politicians accountable and to force states to hand over their voter rolls to the Department of Homeland Security for screening.
More than 140 million Americans do not have a passport, and more than 69 million married women do not have a birth certificate that matches their legal name. Calling the SAVE Act a “voter ID” bill is a trick to make it more palatable to Americans; its core requirement for Americans to present citizenship documents to an election official in person will upend voter registration across the country and block Americans who do not have these documents from voting.
For more information or to speak with an expert, please contact Sam Hananel at [email protected].