He is now threatening not to sign any other bills until Congress passes the SAVE America Act.

Donald Trump threatened on Sunday to withhold his signature from all bills until Congress passes a GOP-led voting bill that implements voter restrictions ahead of the November midterms.

“I, as President, will not sign other Bills until this is passed, AND NOT THE WATERED DOWN VERSION – GO FOR THE GOLD: MUST SHOW VOTER I.D. & PROOF OF CITIZENSHIP: NO MAIL-IN BALLOTS EXCEPT FOR MILITARY – ILLNESS, DISABILITY, TRAVEL,” Trump posted on his social media platform, Truth Social.

The bill, called the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or SAVE America Act, requires individuals to show citizenship documents to register to vote and strict forms of photo ID to cast a ballot. If passed, the legislation would also administer criminal penalties for election officials who register anyone lacking the required documents.

As my colleague Ari Berman wrote in February, the bill would potentially block tens of millions of Americans from voting. Nine percent of American citizens, or approximately 21 million people, don’t have ready access to citizenship documents. The bill may impact millions of US citizens in other ways: tens of millions of women who took their partner’s last name, for example, may not have a birth certificate that matches their legal name could find it more difficult to register.

  • lonefighter@sh.itjust.works
    111·
    10 days ago

    For people who might not be in the US and don’t understand why this is a bad idea in the US and proportionately hurts poor people, proof of citizenship is usually a passport. A passport costs $130. You need supporting documents like your birth certificate, SSN, and a drivers license/state ID to get it. For your first passport you usually have to make an appointment to go somewhere authorized like a library, post office, or courthouse to apply, and then they send the application off and it can take weeks to months to get back, depending how backed up the processing agency is (and I’m sure there will be artificial delays during voting years if this passes). Also, they are passing laws limiting where you can go to apply, so now libraries and the post office are losing the ability to process passport applications, so people will have to go to the county courthouse, which could be a long drive from where they live, especially if you live in a rural area. For people who don’t drive, or only have one car that is shared with another working adult, or use public transportation that has a limited range (or just doesn’t exist in most of the US), or are disabled and can’t travel far, this can be a huge problem.

    Also, all these places are only open during normal business hours, so you probably have to take time off work to go apply. Federal minimum wage is only $7.25/hr while the living wage is actually much higher (living wage for 1 adult living alone in a 1 bedroom apartment where I live was considered almost $23/hr in 2024), and if someone is making minimum wage or close to it they almost certainly aren’t getting paid time off, so now they have to come up with $130 for the fee and lose time off work.

    • orclev@lemmy.world
      56·
      10 days ago

      Also not that it matters anymore but the Supreme Court already ruled it unconstitutional a long time ago as it’s a form of poll tax. Remember when Supreme Court decisions weren’t just “whatever Trump wants today” and actually were based on the constitution? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

      • arrow74@lemmy.zip
        6·
        10 days ago

        The current court regularly votes down Trump, tariffs are the most recent example.

        The issue is the court is full of conservative assholes who care more about their feelings more than the law.

        Don’t get me wrong this is still a Trump caused problem, he appointed most of the new conservatives, but they still don’t rubber stamp everything he does.

        • phutatorius@lemmy.zip
          1·
          8 days ago

          When push comes to shove, the current court sides with Trump on matters of executive power. The only exceptions are when bug business’s ox has been gored, such as the recent tariff decision.

    • Pyr@lemmy.ca
      11·
      10 days ago

      It’s curious why they would want to implement this because although it affects poor people, it would probably also disproportionately affect poor Republicans.

      Many voters in states like Mississippi/Arkansas do not have passports because they are both poor and have no intention to travel internationally so don’t bother with passports.

      • ramble81@lemmy.zip
        30·
        10 days ago

        Because you won’t see it enforced in Mississippi or Arkansas, at least for white republicans. It will be selectively enforced to disenfranchise as needed.

      • MerryJaneDoe@lemmy.world
        5·
        10 days ago

        it would probably also disproportionately affect poor Republicans

        If MAGA thought that it would be a disadvantage to their voter base, they would not be pushing for it.

    • andallthat@lemmy.world
      6·
      10 days ago

      I am not from the US, so I’m also mentally comparing with what happens in my country. Here, the place where you’re registered to vote has a list of all voter names and birth dates. You get there to vote, show a form of valid ID (driver’s license is a valid one), you can vote and you’re crossed off the list so you can’t vote twice. You don’t need to prove citizenship directly because if you don’t have the right to vote, you’re not on the list.

      How does it work in the US? Citizenship aside, how do you prove that you are who you say you are and don’t e.g. wear a hat and fake moustache and vote 3 times? Honest question, I’m not judging, I’m genuinely trying to understand how things work today in the US.

      • SpacetimeMachine@lemmy.world
        8·
        10 days ago

        That’s a very hard question to answer because each state runs elections differently. In my state we just get our ballot by mail and you send that in with your signature. If you don’t have an address there are polling places available, but it’s been so long I’m not certain how they check ID.

        • lonefighter@sh.itjust.works
          3·
          10 days ago

          In my state you can apply to get your ballot by mail, but you have to do that for every election (which reminds me, I need to send my application in for the next election). If you don’t do that you can go in person to the voting location that is predetermined for you based on your address. They have a list of everyone who is registered as eligible to vote in person at that location. When you register to vote you get a voter ID card in the mail which is basically a little paper card with your name, county, and the location that you vote at. You just take your voter card with you to vote and they cross you off the list and give you your ballot to vote in person. If you already registered to vote by mail but you forgot to send your ballot in you can take your mail-in ballot to your in person location and they’ll tear it up and let you vote in person.

      • gloog@fedia.io
        4·
        10 days ago

        For the most part - it works exactly like what you described. What kinds of ID are valid, and to some extent whether you are required to present one at all, depends on which state you live in.

        The fake mustache double voter would have to know the details of another person who is already registered to vote (only some states allow same-day voter registration) and gambles on the other person not showing up to vote.

        One big difference between the US and a lot of other democracies (when it comes to voting laws) is that the US doesn’t have any form of universal national identification documents - pretty much everything is issued on a state-by-state basis, and with very few exceptions those state level IDs don’t actually say anything about citizenship - noncitizen permanent residents are allowed to get driver’s licenses.

        • andallthat@lemmy.world
          2·
          10 days ago

          Thank you for your answer!

          But is there a register, somewhere that @gloog@fedia.io is a person that was born in Your-city/Your-state and is a US national? So, even if you don’t need to show an ID to prove you are indeed gloog, can a gloog be in the registered voters list if they are not a US citizen?

          I’m asking because I read from other posts that the process to get a passport or even a birth or marriage certificate seem to be relatively complex, while here you can basically download your marriage certificate online. But this relies on the fact that there are City and Nation-wide databases that have a record of a person with my name being born in X, a Y national, married with Z and father of W. So if I can prove my identity as andallthat, all these other things (including nationality) follow almost “for free”, or at least more easily.

          So I was wondering if the key difference might not be proving Citizenship per se, but the fact that records are not centralized and it’s harder to go quickly from “I am this person” to “this person is a US National”?

          • gloog@fedia.io
            3·
            10 days ago

            There isn’t one centralized database with that information for everyone. Each state, and even inside one state each county, maintains their own records, so someone who is born in Florida, gets married in California, and then has a kid born in Oregon would need to contact each of those states for proof of those events if they lost the original copies for whatever reason. There is a national system that can (mostly) check against those state and local level records, but it also has limitations. Passports and birth certificates can be proof of citizenship, but don’t prove where you live at the time of the election even if you do have one on hand.

            The voter registration process already gives the state enough information to determine whether an individual is eligible to vote in that state. For federal elections (which are still run by the states, just for federal level positions), that includes confirming that the person is a citizen, but each state is able to decide whether to allow noncitizen residents to vote on local government issues or not.

    • partial_accumen@lemmy.world
      4·
      10 days ago

      and if someone is making minimum wage or close to it they almost certainly aren’t getting paid time off, so now they have to come up with $130 for the fee and lose time off work.

      A passport card is only $30 (plus the $10 or so dollars for the required photo), but everything else in your post is spot on.

        • partial_accumen@lemmy.world
          3·
          10 days ago

          Even better, you can have the card expire off-cycle from the book. Since both last 10 years, if you renew one at the 5 year mark, it means you’ll always have an active document that can get you to Canada or Mexico even while the other is in the renewal cycle.

          I recently learned this after renewing both at the same time missing my opportunity. I’ll renew the card early in 5 years or so to get this off-cycle expiry benefit.

    • jacksilver@lemmy.world
      4·
      10 days ago

      While I don’t think this should ever pass, I think a huge issue is we’re too close to the election to be changing how voting works. People could vote in the primaries and then not have the documents to vote in the actual election. Something like this would need to be phased in over time, just think about how long Real IDs took to implement.

  • Blackmist@feddit.ukEnglish
    75·
    10 days ago

    “If conservatives become convinced that they can not win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.”

    • Hildegarde
      7·
      10 days ago

      That’s been their behavior continuously since the country’s founding. This is nothing new.

      • Hildegarde
        3·
        9 days ago

        Every state requires proof of citizenship to register to vote. All registered voters are citizens. Read a book.

      • phutatorius@lemmy.zip
        2·
        8 days ago

        Look at the implementation detail, not the principle. This doesn’t just require proof of citizenship, which is already a precondition for voter registration in every state. It imposes draconian “papers-in-order” that is specifically aimed at women, urban and poor people, who are just concidentally the populations less likely to vote for fascists.

        Never believe that their proposed laws are for their stated purpose.

        • legolasfanboy@lemmy.world
          1·
          8 days ago

          That’s entirely wrong. It doesn’t target women at all, and it’s very demeaning of you to assume that urban and poor people can’t get or don’t have access to a state issued ID. That’s sexist, classist, and racist of you.

  • FuglyDuck@lemmy.worldEnglish
    60·
    11 days ago

    Because more and more people hate his guts with the fury of a thousand women scorned.

    And for good reason.

    • CADmonkey@lemmy.world
      3·
      10 days ago

      I’ve been trying to float the idea of voters showing up to the polls armed. Everyone who has a firearm, carry it to vote. Not in a threatening manner, no waving them around, just… Everyone who has one is armed.

      • Tiresia@slrpnk.net
        2·
        10 days ago

        Great, so how is that going to help Mrs. Jones who can’t afford sufficient notary proof of her marriage to explain why she isn’t called Miss Smith, resulting in the polling place refusing to give her a ballot?

        Voting is an administrative procedure, so rigging an election can be done purely procedurally. Once the election is rigged, no amount of weapons used defensively will unrig it. Maybe they will send ICE to pick people out of the line in Latino neighborhoods, but they don’t need to in order to win. And even if they send ICE, it wouldn’t help if the people with guns stand around gormlessly as they drag people into vans, or as they themselves get arrested.

        I suppose them doing more than that wouldn’t be the worst inciting incident for a civil war, but again: it’s perfectly possible for the election to get rigged without violence.

  • anon_8675309@lemmy.world
    12·
    10 days ago

    Every time mail in ballots is brought up I mention that Florida has a successful mail in ballot system and they’ve been Republican for well over two decades.

      • Spitefire@lemmy.world
        4·
        10 days ago

        Salt Lake County’s voting process is straight up fire, Sherrie Swensen was amazing. One of the only things I miss about Utah.

    • IamSparticles@lemmy.zipEnglish
      2·
      10 days ago

      they’ve been Republican for well over two decades.

      That’s not entirely true. At least when it comes to presidential elections, Florida has been a swing state for the last two decades. They went for Obama in 2008 and 2012.

      • anon_8675309@lemmy.world
        2·
        10 days ago

        I was talking about governor. If there was anything wrong with mail in voting in florida, you could bet your ass it would have been illegal by now. But there’s nothing wrong with it so all the republicans in Florida leave it as it is.

  • orlyowl@piefed.caEnglish
    8·
    10 days ago

    I’ve got a lot of worry about how much time he still has to get this passed, and about the viability of the midterms in general. I’m very worried he finds a way to suspend them, or actually gets this bill passed. (Or both)

    • CannonFodder@lemmy.world
      8·
      10 days ago

      He will get this passed, or do it with some sort of executive order. Most left leaning states will ignore these things as they constitutionally have no power. And trump will use that at a reason to invalidate those states’s votes entirely. This will cause violent protests. Trump will bring in the military and declare marshal law. We will then have a dictatorship with trump and his sons as dictators for generations.

  • certified_expert@lemmy.world
    7·
    10 days ago

    I am from a country in which you normally take your ID document with you and cast your vote in person. All the millions of us do it, and the afternoon of that day we have the total count of votes. It is a very straightforward process.

    I am not supporting Trump, really, but why would the implementation of this be a negative thing?

    • dhork@lemmy.worldEnglish
      38·
      10 days ago

      How do you get your ID document? Does it cost a lot to get? Does any official look at perfectly valid ID and say “I don’t think that’s real, so you don’t get to vote”?

      We have no national ID here, the closest thing to prove citizenship is a passport but people are not required to have one, and it is expensive. For most people, the only definitive proof of citizenship they have is their original birth certificate.

      That is why here, in the US, when politicians push Voter ID laws it’s mainly to disenfranchise poor people.

      • certified_expert@lemmy.world
        9·
        10 days ago

        I once hard (here) that people in USA is kind of against having an ID document.

        It ended up anyway giving them one of the crappiest IDs in any country: SSNs

        to answer your questions: it is super cheap (~5 US dollars), fast, has many security systems, it is quickly verifyable agains government databases, it has a photo, your signature, and, if valid, nobody will question it.

        It looks like a mini version of the plastic card in mdern pastports (of the size of a credit card)

        The police can stop you and without probable cause ask you for your ID (and car/driving documents if in a car), check it against the national database, and give it back to you. You have to show it (required by law) and it is your responsibility (if you are over 18) to keep it with you. The intention is to catch people with pending charges or arrest orders and stuff. If you are not hiding from the law, it is a simple, civilized interaction that would take you 2~5 mins.

        You know, the kind of things that you would expect from a 3rd world country, less developed than USA.

        • fizzle@quokk.auEnglish
          11·
          10 days ago

          The police can stop you and without probable cause ask you for your ID

          Here in Australia this would be considered a draconian overreach and an invasion of privacy.

          You’re not required to carry ID generally, and in my state you’re not even required to carry your driver’s license when driving. They might ask you some details so they can look you up, and they might ask you to bring your id to a police station within 48 hours, but honestly I’ve never had that happen.

          You’re describing the requirement to carry ID like its just a basic feature of modern society, but not all societies work that way.

          In the SE Asian countries I’ve visited national IDs are more common because of porous borders. Checkpoints on highways are opportunities to exploit migrant workers, basically.

        • Jyek@sh.itjust.works
          11·
          10 days ago

          SSN are not an ID. Well they aren’t meant to be an ID. It’s just a number assigned to every citizen eligible for an account with the Social Security Administration. It just so happens that this is a convenient, unique number that every citizen has to use to get a job (employees pay into social security with each pay check) so it’s been used to identify people by their numbers.

    • Throbbing_banjo@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      27·
      10 days ago

      Because the hoops they make you jump through to get one are fucking ridiculous.

      I’m a US citizen. I was a born here. I have a driver’s license and a US-issued passport. Both of these are current and I had to prove citizenship to get the passport.

      I’m still not able to legally vote in my state, though, because the law now requires that my driver’s license, which doesn’t expire for 4 years, have a Gold Star on it. No gold star, you can’t vote.

      I now have to make an appointment and drive to a licensing station in another city to get my Gold Star license in order to vote. I have to bring my still-valid passport, two pieces of mail, and a copy of my birth certificate. I can’t even vote in a primary if I don’t do that first.

      I was born here, I haven’t changed my name or moved, this is just the law now. They just really don’t want people to be able to vote.

      • dhork@lemmy.worldEnglish
        7·
        10 days ago

        No gold star, you can’t vote.

        Wait, they won’t take a passport? That’s nuts. I can see them requiring a DL in addition to the passport, because your passport doesn’t prove where you live, while a DL does. But not accepting the passport as proof of citizenship at all is bonkers.

        Which backwards state is this?

        • Throbbing_banjo@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
          7·
          10 days ago

          Iowa.

          When I was a kid, our state essentially set the national standard for education and college readiness. While we were a deep purple state for a long time, the conservatives here were more of the balanced budget and family values variety.

          The last 30ish years of education defunding and media balkanization has had a colossal impact on the rural population here. Outside of the cities, I barely recognize it as my home state anymore. People are hateful, fearful, distrustful of outsiders, and paranoid. They wear hate like a badge of honor.

          I know this is happening in all of the rural states, but witnessing it firsthand has been pretty brutal.

    • rozodru@piefed.worldEnglish
      8·
      10 days ago

      as others have stated the US doesn’t have what other countries would consider a national ID. they have a Drivers License and a Passport, that’s it. I think some states might have a regular photo ID but I’m not sure it’s been several years since I lived in the US. and then some people have like a military ID.

      The problem is other than the Passport none of those are proof of citizenship. None citizens can get a drivers license, none citizens can serve in the military, none citizens can even get a social security number/card. So the only way to prove citizenship is like Passport or Birth Certificate. Not even sure how US Citizens who became citizens after landing would prove it and with how ICE is that would be an extremely risky thing to present/prove when going to vote.

      So then you have the problem that A. Not everyone has/can afford a Passport and B. not everyone has a Birth Certificate or their name has changed on it or their gender has changed, etc.

      Thus when you consider all these things you then realize that voting in the US only a fraction of the US population would be 100% eligible. and EVEN then they could deny you for whatever reason they deemed fit. And even just requiring a passport and birth certificate it’s easy to then figure out WHO they’re targeting based on demographics. Low income people aren’t going to have a passport, like it or not a majority of Black Americans aren’t going to have one, Trans people won’t be eligible, Women who married likely won’t be if they took their spouses last name, people who were adopted, all US citizens that became one after immigrating to the US, etc, etc, etc.

      • certified_expert@lemmy.world
        3·
        10 days ago

        This country is so weird… It is so full of stuff that makes no sense. And the strange part (to me) is how natural this is for its inhabitants.

    • Therefore@lemmy.world
      6·
      10 days ago

      This is proof of citizenship. Not drivers license or proof of age. Passport, birth cert plus supporting, citizenship cert and supporting. Discrepancy between the latter two options resulting from change of name could disqualify voters.

      “Nine percent of American citizens, or approximately 21 million people, don’t have ready access to citizenship documents.”

      Then you have my country where you enroll to vote, which requires id, lasts forever and you only have to update your address. On the day the volunteer looks up my given name on a ledger for my area, asks for my address and phone number, then explains how to write my vote.