During a televised prime-time address Thursday, President Donald Trump continued to claim that the 2020 presidential election results were illegitimate and that only passage of the SAVE America Act would restore integrity to American elections.
Trump began the address by saying America is now “the hottest country anywhere in the world” and is “winning big in Iran.” He then declared that “there’s no third world country that has elections like we have” and accused the press, including NBC and ABC, of participating in a conspiracy to perpetuate election fraud.
“Hundreds of millions of U.S. voter files are in the hands of foreign governments,” Trump said. “Our machines and ballot counting systems are exposed to hacking and manipulation and corruption. China and other countries have been trying to meddle in our elections. Evidence of fraud has been buried.”
Trump also cited CIA reports on election fraud in Venezuela to support his belief that U.S. elections are not secure.
In the six years since the 2020 election, authorities have validated few cases of intentional voter fraud. Despite Trump’s belief that the 2020 election was stolen from him while he was president, voters elected him again in 2024 while Democrats controlled the White House and Republicans controlled the House of Representatives.
“But most importantly, addressing this crisis of election security demands that Congress must pass the SAVE America Act,” Trump said. “How easy is that to do, unless you want to cheat. The only reason you wouldn’t do it is you want to cheat because your policies are so bad, and your candidates are so pathetic that you can’t get away or can’t get elected any other way.”
In a public response to Trump’s address, U.S. Representative Terri Sewell, D-Alabama, said the president “has once again chosen to traffic in baseless and debunked conspiracy theories about past elections to distract from his failed policies and broken promises.”
Sewell is co-chair of the Congressional Voting Rights Caucus and has consistently advocated for reforms intended to make voting easier.
“Let’s be clear. If Trump actually cared about the integrity of our elections, he wouldn’t be firing the leaders of the Election Assistance Commission, the bipartisan agency that helps administer them,” Sewell said. “If he cared about fairness, his administration wouldn’t be working to dismantle the Voting Rights Act. And if he cared about the will of the people, he wouldn’t be pushing the SAVE America Act, legislation designed to block millions of eligible Americans from voting.”
The SAVE America Act would require voters to show photo identification when voting and provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote.
Research by the Brennan Center for Justice suggests millions of eligible voters do not have ready access to the documents required to register. Americans who have changed their names, including many married women, could face additional hurdles because their current names might not match the names on documents used as proof of citizenship.
Alabama Senators Tommy Tuberville, R-Alabama, and Katie Britt, R-Alabama, are co-sponsors of the SAVE America Act.
Shortly after Trump’s address Thursday, Tuberville reposted a White House excerpt from the speech, adding, “if we don’t pass the SAVE America Act, we might as well all pack up and go home.” He also again endorsed eliminating the filibuster.
