The US House will consider new election sanctions before the November midterms

By David Morgan

WASHINGTON, Feb 11 (Reuters) – The Republican-controlled House of Representatives is expected to vote on Wednesday on a bill to require proof of U.S. citizenship in November’s midterm elections, which Democrats denounced as a ploy to hurt their chances in the race to determine control of Congress.

The Save America Act is the latest version of the law that first appeared in the 2024 presidential campaign, driven by President Donald Trump’s false claims that large numbers of people in the country are voting illegally in federal elections.

A similar measure passed the House twice — last April and in 2024 — with the support of a handful of Democrats. but died in the Senate.

The House’s vote on the bill comes just a week after Trump called on Republicans to “finish” elections in more than a dozen seats. The bill would require proof of citizenship when registering to vote in the midterms and would impose criminal penalties on election officials who register someone without the required documents.

Republicans have also added a photo ID requirement for subsequent federal elections for people who vote at the polls or by mail-in ballots. They cited a Pew Research Center poll that found 83% of voters, including 71% of Democrats, return photo ID for voters.

Republicans are worried about losing a special election

Democratic Party leaders say the law seeks to suppress voting and undermine their electoral chances after they are backed by independent analysts to take control of the House. Republicans have been reeling from a string of Democratic special election victories, including what was seen as a wake-up call for the Texas state Senate.

“Republicans are trying to build a base to undermine the midterm elections that I think they’re worried about losing on the merits,” said Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who compared the citizenship requirement to a poll tax used to prevent blacks and the poor from voting in southern US states.

If passed by the House, the bill would face long hurdles in the Republican-led Senate, where it needs Democratic support to meet a 60-vote margin to pass. Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has denounced it as “Jim Crow 2.0.”

It is already illegal for non-citizens to vote in federal elections. Independent groups on the left and right, as well as state election officials, say such polls are extremely rare.

The left-leaning Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law has warned that the Save America Act could deny voting to millions of US citizens who are unwilling to access passports, birth certificates and other documents proving their citizenship.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise described the citizenship requirement as a “real common sense” standard to protect Americans.

“Everybody understands what that means,” Scalise told reporters Tuesday. “If someone steals your vote, you’re voiding your vote.”

Democracy advocates say the law is part of a larger struggle between the Trump administration and state governments that includes withholding federal funding, the deployment of National Guard troops and an FBI search of county election offices in Georgia.

“We have checks and balances that include state and local officials acting as checks against federal overreach,” said Mae Ratakonda, program director for election protection at the United States Democratic Center, a nonpartisan group that works to protect free and fair elections. “That’s what the federal government is trying to undermine.”

Republican leaders say the law is needed to restore public confidence in the election system, and Democrats oppose it because they want non-citizens who entered the United States illegally to vote under President Joe Biden.

“There’s only one logical reason Democrats are opposing it. They want to participate in an election that people don’t want. That’s what wide borders was about,” House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters Tuesday.

Democrats say any decline in electoral confidence is the result of Trump’s repeated false claims about noncitizen voting and a stolen 2020 election.

U.S. Senator Adam Schiff, Democrat of California, told ABC News in a recent interview, “Republicans have created distrust in elections. He described the Save America Act as a “voter suppression” law.

Republicans are also preparing a second, broader election bill, called the Make Elections Great Again Act, which would mandate the use of paper ballots, ban mail-in ballots and ban ranked-choice voting in federal general elections. It was investigated in the hearing held in the House Administration Committee on Tuesday.

(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Edmund Claman)