Trump and the Republicans know they’re going to lose control of at least the House in November and could be in for a drubbing. Since the end of WWII, the President’s party has lost House seats in 90% of midterm elections and in 100% when the President has bad polling numbers (like Trump’s).
So Trump has claimed there is rampant voter fraud1 and that the federal government needs to step in to ‘fix’ the election process. His plan is called the “SAVE America Act”.
The SAVE America Act
This legislation that Trump is trying to pass, makes it harder for people to vote. Although “SAVE” is an acronym for “Safeguard American Voter Eligibility”, this legislation is designed to stop millions of Americans from voting.
The SAVE America Act requires voters to provide documented proof of citizenship at the time of registration (a passport or birth certificate). It also requires voters to present a qualified photo ID to cast a ballot. Voting by mail is more difficult as well.
To give an idea of the impact this bill would have:
- 34.5 million Americans don’t have a current driver’s license or state ID card
- 21 million Americans don’t have ready access to a birth certificate
- 50% of Americans don’t have passports
Women who get married and change their names would be particularly impacted by these obstacles. There are other serious aspects to this legislation, which are detailed here, in addition to the issues of Gerrymandering and Trump’s threat to “nationalize elections”.
Where is the SAVE America Act today?
As of the end of July, the SAVE America Act has been passed by the House (narrowly) but is still DOA in the Senate since it takes 60 votes to pass bills over the filibuster and the Republicans have only 53 Senators. Republicans’ other efforts, such as the “Budget Reconciliation” process are also likely to fail in the Senate.
As November gets closer, the likelihood of any kind of national-level changes to election procedures gets lower. Besides being logistically daunting, there are legal principles against altering voting rules this close to an election. As a result the strategic focus surrounding the SAVE Act may be shifting from efforts to make substantive changes for this year’s election to longer-term goals in general and to state-level efforts.
The SAVE ACT won’t save the election for Trump, so what do we need to do? We need to keep doing the thing we’re doing, it’s working! In particular, supporting the organizations that are winning in the courts. Democracy Forward, the ACLU, the NRDC and multiple state Attorneys General are behind a big percentage of the lawsuits brought against the administration. In addition, Democracy Docket sponsors legal action but also tracks, analyzes and provides data on voter suppression and the Trump Accountability lawsuits filed by the organizations mentioned previously.
For more details on voter suppression hit this button:
1This is a lie. According to CNN, “The right-leaning Heritage Foundation’s database of confirmed fraud cases, for instance, shows fewer than 100 examples [nationwide] of noncitizens improperly casting ballots between 2000 and 2025.”