The GOP’s sweeping new anti-voting bill cleared the U.S. House Wednesday, setting up a high-stakes battle in the Senate.
The House voted 218-213 to pass the SAVE America Act, which experts have said could disenfranchise millions by requiring voters to show documentary proof of citizenship at registration and to provide photo ID when they cast ballots.
Republicans have argued for voter ID broadly, pointing out that there isn’t much to prevent a noncitizen from casting a ballot in a federal election — besides the fact that it’s a felony, easily caught, and would lead to deportation all for the chance to cast one out of hundreds of thousands of votes.
The United States works a lot more like the EU than any individual country. Each state has its own politics and leadership. Some states try to make things easier, some try to make things harder, and it can all flip from one election to another. It makes it very hard to make any kind of progress. A passport would work as ID just about anywhere, but less than half of Americans have one. I don’t (and I’ve been out of the country a couple times).