Republicans Fight for Bill Safeguarding Citizen-Only Voting

Ashley Oliver writes for the Washington Examiner about a significant debate on Capitol Hill this week.

One of Republicans’ top priorities in Congress is preventing noncitizen participation in elections, a problem that Democrats argue is nonexistent.

With the 2024 election quickly approaching, Republicans say it is a growing worry among their constituents and that a federal crackdown is the best way to eliminate their concerns.

The solution, according to Republicans, is to pass the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE, Act, a national proof of citizenship bill that Democrats largely oppose. The legislation is dead on arrival in the Democratic-controlled Senate, but House Republican leaders have made it their sole condition of passing a temporary funding bill to prevent a government shutdown.

As that fight plays out in Congress this week, some legal and policy experts have also championed the SAVE Act, saying it would have real-world consequences to better secure elections.

“That is what we need,” Chad Ennis, a longtime attorney and Honest Elections Project vice president, told the Washington Examiner. “We need to require, like Arizona’s tried … that when you register to vote, you show that you’re a citizen as well, as part of your qualification.”

The SAVE Act encapsulates two issues that have dominated the Republican Party: secure elections and immigration.

Republicans have since 2020 had a heightened sensitivity to voter fraud. In the last presidential election, when former President Donald Trump narrowly lost his race, the defeat came after many states loosened their voting laws on an emergency basis in the name of COVID-19.

Additionally, the Biden administration has been defined in part by exorbitant illegal migration numbers. Federal data indicate that since President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris took office, more than 5.6 million migrants who have crossed into the country illegally have been released into the United States, often under the promise that they will appear at a later date in an immigration court.