House Republicans pass ‘SAVE America Act’ to require proof of citizenship to vote while acknowledging it could disenfranchise Americans

WASHINGTON – The Republican-controlled House of Representatives voted on Wednesday to pass a bill that would require proof of U.S. citizenship to vote, after Northwest GOP lawmakers acknowledged that implementing such a requirement may disenfranchise Americans.

With all but one Democrat opposed, every House Republican voted for the “SAVE America Act” a week after President Donald Trump said the GOP should “take over” elections and “nationalize the voting,” while he continued to claim without proof that he won an election he lost in 2020. Citing polls that show most Americans broadly support requiring ID to vote, Republicans hope the issue will help them politically ahead of November’s midterm elections.

“I think you ought to show proof of citizenship when you vote,” Rep. Mike Simpson, a Republican from Idaho Falls, said in a brief interview before the final vote. Asked whether he had seen evidence of noncitizens voting, he replied, “We do have some. I don’t know what numbers there are, and I don’t know how accurate those numbers are.”

It’s already illegal and extremely rare for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, with an analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice in 2017 finding an estimated 30 cases of suspected noncitizen voting in a review of 23.5 million votes – a rate of 0.0001%. Fraudulent voting leaves a paper trail that makes it relatively easy for officials to punish under existing laws.

Simpson said Idaho already requires ID to vote, then acknowledged that an ID doesn’t prove citizenship. He said he didn’t think Idaho would have a problem implementing the law, but when asked whether the state’s election officials could do that before the November election, he said, “I don’t know. Good question.”

Rep. Russ Fulcher, a Republican who represents North Idaho, said he disagreed with Trump’s call for the federal government to take over elections – a statement the president made Feb. 2 on former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino’s podcast – but he believed the bill is “not an attempt to try to take over state-run elections.”

“I think having to go through a process, whether it be state authorized or not, that identifies citizenship and ID, that’s reasonable,” Fulcher said. “I can tell you, that’s an overwhelmingly popular idea in Idaho.”

When asked how the bill would work for Americans who have neither a passport nor a birth certificate on hand to prove their citizenship, Rep. Dan Newhouse replied, “I’ll just say it’s a valid question. We’ll be talking about this before the vote.”

Five hours later, the Republican from Sunnyside voted for the bill and released a statement saying, “I oppose calls to ‘nationalize’ our elections but support common-sense reforms to make our elections more secure.”

“Election law is a complicated and intricate issue,” Newhouse said in the statement. “While the Constitution grants states the power to conduct elections, the federal government has a responsibility to safeguard the integrity of federal elections. Requiring identification and proof of citizenship to vote ensures that only American citizens are participating in our democratic process.”

Article I of the U.S. Constitution gives states the power to run elections, while letting Congress pass nationwide voting regulations so long as those regulations don’t infringe on states’ rights. The Supreme Court has interpreted the nation’s foundational text to mean that states have authority over voter registration, ballot counting, preventing fraud and otherwise running elections.

The bill is likely to stall in the Senate, where the filibuster rule allows a unified Democratic minority to block it and Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has signaled he won’t change that rule to pass what critics say is a “messaging bill” designed to score political points, not to solve real problems. Democrats argue that the legislation would make it harder for Americans to vote and violate states’ rights.

“The SAVE Act is dead on arrival in the Senate,” Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said in a statement. “It’s not simply about voter ID, it would impose outrageous voter suppression requirements on American citizens, like married women who take their spouse’s name – whose last name may not match their birth certificate. So what? Those millions of women don’t get to vote in our elections now?”

Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of southwest Washington was one of four Democrats who voted for an earlier version of the bill in April 2025, before Trump demanded changes including the provision requiring proof of citizenship. After voting against the revised bill on Wednesday, she said it “would undermine our state’s longstanding elections process by forcing Washingtonians to jump through nonsensical bureaucratic hoops in order to mail in their ballot.”

“All of us in Southwest Washington agree that only U.S. citizens should determine the outcome of U.S. elections, but this bill is more concerned with duct-taping together a government-run photocopying service than actually advancing the serious goal of ensuring free and fair elections,” Gluesenkamp Perez said.

In an interview on Tuesday, Rep. Michael Baumgartner said the bill could help Americans regain trust in the nation’s elections. Unlike most Republicans in Congress, the Spokane Republican has said he believes Trump lost the 2020 election.

“Across the board, on both the right and the left, there have been things that have degraded trust in elections,” Baumgartner said. “So we need to restore trust in elections and the perception of election integrity. That ought to start with voter identification.”

Rep. Adam Smith, a Bellevue Democrat, said in a brief interview Wednesday that “you should absolutely have to prove your identity before you vote,” but states already require that.

“There’s no question that Trump doesn’t want a free and fair election,” Smith said. “That was proved in 2020 – he didn’t get the outcome he wanted, so he tried to overturn it. And I have no doubt that the Trump administration is going to try to undermine the ability of Democrats to vote at every turn in this midterm election, and it’s something we should all be very concerned about.”

Rep. Rick Larsen, a Democrat from Everett, said he had “no idea” how the bill could be implemented if Senate Republicans succeed in passing it and Trump signs it into law.

“I don’t know which America the folks are trying to ‘save’ with this bill,” Larsen said in a brief interview. “But the secretary of state and local county auditors do a very good job in our state of conducting elections, and they don’t need the ‘SAVE America Act’ to help them do that.”

After noting the popularity of requiring an ID to vote, Simpson said if he were in charge of the Senate, “I’d make them vote on it every day,” because the issue is a “huge” political winner for Republicans ahead of the midterm elections.

Asked if he had a copy of his own birth certificate to prove his citizenship, Simpson replied, “I assume my wife’s got one somewhere.”