U.S. Senator Katie Britt, a Republican from Alabama, reaffirmed her support for the SAVE Act, a controversial bill first introduced by U.S. Senator Mike Lee, a Republican from Utah, last year that would require voters to provide proof of citizenship to access the ballot box.
“I am proud to be a cosponsor of the SAVE Act,” Britt said. “Securing our elections has been a priority of mine since day one, which is why I also authored the Citizen Ballot Protection Act. Election integrity—and ensuring only American citizens are voting in our elections—is critical to our democracy and to free and fair elections. We must take every step possible to achieve this.”
Britt added: “I will continue fighting for election integrity. As a proud cosponsor of the SAVE Act and author of the Citizen Ballot Protection Act, I look forward to working with my colleagues to send commonsense laws to President Trump’s desk.”
The SAVE Act would specifically mandate that voters provide identification compliant with the most recent REAL ID guidelines, a passport or some other documentation of citizenship. For any ID that does not disclose the individual’s birthplace or citizenship status, the voter must also provide a birth certificate, naturalization certificate, adoption decree or some other document that proves they were born in the U.S.
A version of the SAVE Act previously passed in the House last April, but has since stalled in the Senate where Democratic support would be needed to override a filibuster. However, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-Louisiana, recently announced that House Republicans are now looking to send an even stricter version of the bill to the Senate which would add an additional photo ID requirement for voters.
Critics of the SAVE Act cite research showing than more than 9 percent of legal voters in the U.S.—around 21.3 million people—do not have citizenship documents readily on hand, including married women who have changed their last names. The Brennan Center for Justice has said that the SAVE Act would be “one of the worst voting laws in congressional history.”
Despite these concerns, President Donald Trump and his allies have continued to call for stricter voting requirements related to citizenship. Trump signed an executive order last March directing states to require citizenship documentation for voter registration, but that order was subsequently struck down in federal court.
Controversy related to citizenship issues, including the SAVE Act, is unlikely to dissipate anytime soon, as tensions related to the Trump administration’s mass deportation regime continue to escalate in the wake of Renee Good’s killing at the hands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE, in Minneapolis earlier this month.
