As the Senate considers how to move forward with the SAVE America Act, election experts and local election officials raised concerns about passing the bill amid the 2026 primary season kicking off.
The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE America Act, would require Americans to prove they are citizens when they register to vote, mostly through a valid U.S. passport or birth certificate. It would also require a valid photo identification before voters can cast ballots, which some states already demand.
It was approved on a mostly party-line vote, 218-213, in the House in February. It is currently in the hands of the Senate.
Elizabeth Bennion, Chancellor’s Professor of Political Science at Indiana University South Bend, said the timing of Congress considering the SAVE America Act during the primary season “is designed to signal to Republican voters that current elected officials and GOP leaders are prioritizing election security.”
Republicans have pushed the SAVE America Act because of election security concerns, while Democrats have opposed the bill because of worries that it would disenfranchise voters, including new citizens, women, poor people, young people, among others, Bennion said. Not all citizens have passports, Bennion said, and it is expensive to get a passport.
It’s unsurprising that Republicans are more likely to support the SAVE America Act because it’s likely that more Democrats will be negatively affected by having to show a passport, birth certificate or documentation of proof of name change when registering to vote, Bennion said.
“This is really a discussion about burden of proof rather than fraud. There is no evidence of widespread or election-changing fraud in the U.S. election system. We know that in-person voting fraud is exceptionally rare, and there’s no empirical reason why these tightened ID requirements would be needed,” Bennion said.
Lake County Board of Elections and Registration Director Michelle Fajman said she’s concerned about the SAVE America Act because it will disproportionately affect women, particularly women who changed their names after getting married.
Securing paperwork to prove a name change is time-consuming and it costs money, Fajman said. The burden increases if a woman was married in one state but moved, she said.
“I hate to see where we’re going back to the days where women, you didn’t have as much rights as men, and things are different because you are female,” Fajman said. “It just feels like we’re going back in time.”
Voters who would have to secure a copy of their birth certificate would face similar challenges, Fajman said. The challenges would increase if that voter moved away from the state where they were born, was born in a different country, or live in a region where natural disasters, like Hurricane Katrina, could’ve wiped vital records, she said.
“It’s not your constitutional right that you have to have a passport. Our constitutional right is that we have the right to vote. Why are we making it more difficult?” Fajman said.
Voters have called the election office to ask about the impacts of the SAVE America Act and what documents they may need, Fajman said. While the bill’s fate isn’t clear, Fajman said the office has been communicating with voters to start collecting documents if they feel it will take them time to get the documents, she said.
The timing of the bill “is going to make it a lot more difficult,” Fajman said. If the SAVE America Act becomes law, Fajman said it will likely require additional training for the election staff to learn which documents are now required and now to verify them, she said.
“Our goal should be to promote voting and to get our numbers higher, not looking at disenfranchisement and making it more difficult,” Fajman said.
Marie Eisenstein, associate professor of political science at Indiana University Northwest, said the bill requirements are for federal elections because the federal government can’t dictate to states who votes in state and local elections.
Eisenstein said election fraud isn’t occurring at a level to change the outcome of elections. But, because elections are decentralized, many Americans are concerned about election fraud, she said.
While some voters will be impacted by the bill if it becomes law, Eisenstein said, as a whole, the bill won’t impact election outcomes.
President Donald Trump’s push for the bill, backed by House conservatives and his most loyal supporters ahead of the midterm elections, has put new pressure on Senate Majority Leader John Thune as he tries to navigate an effort from inside and outside Congress to bypass normal Senate procedure. Thune has said he supports the legislation and that his GOP conference is still discussing how to pass it.
In an effort to get around Democratic opposition, Trump and others have pushed a so-called “talking filibuster,” which would bring the Senate back to the days of the movie “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” when senators talked indefinitely to block legislation. Today, the Senate mostly skips the speeches and votes to end debate or cloture, which takes 60 votes in the Senate where Republicans have a 53-47 majority.
Republicans wouldn’t have to change the rules to force a talkathon. They could simply keep the Senate open and make Democrats deliver speeches for days or weeks to delay taking up the legislation. But Thune would still need enough support from his caucus to move forward with that approach, and he said recently that “we aren’t there yet.”
Trump and his supporters say the talking filibuster would allow them to pass the legislation without any Democratic votes. But the maneuver could end up creating more problems for Republicans.
Under a talking filibuster, Democrats would have to stay on the floor and give speeches for an indefinite amount of time to block the bill. Each senator is only allowed two speeches on a particular piece of legislation, so the idea is that Democrats would eventually run out of speeches or quit due to exhaustion, allowing Republicans to proceed with a simple majority vote.
The reality on the floor would be more complicated. Democrats would be able to throw up procedural roadblocks, including restarting the clock for speeches if enough Republicans weren’t also present on the floor. That means nearly all 53 Republicans would need to remain close to the Senate during the filibuster, while only one Democrat would have to keep speaking. The process could last for weeks, given that there are 47 Democrats in the Senate.
Even if Republicans managed to break the first filibuster, Democrats could then offer an unlimited number of amendments on anything they wish, forcing Republicans to take hard votes in an election year and potentially adding some of their own priorities to the legislation if they have some bipartisan support. Each amendment would bring a new round of speeches as well.
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, it was common for the Senate to use this talking filibuster to block legislation, Bennion said. The filibuster was created to allow the Senate to conduct business in a timely manner, she said.
If the Republicans could maintain the discipline required under a filibuster, they could pass the bill with a simple majority of 51 votes, which they would have if the party holds together, Bennion said.
The Democrats would have to be prepared to talk through evenings and weekends to kill the bill, Bennion said.
But, the Democratic base would support the party filibustering to protect voting rights, though the question remains how long the base would support that action. The Republicans’ base would support the party powering through the filibuster and then passing a bill to protect election security, Bennion said.
The only way a filibuster would end would be if the Democrats stop talking or if 60 Senators vote for closure, Bennion said.
If the bill becomes law, Bennion said another concern would be the impacts to election offices across the country who would have to comply with new rules, like verifying citizenship of those registered to vote and those on the voter rolls. The concerns increase when considering that the election workers would face criminal penalties if a mistake was made, she said.
“All this creates a significant unfunded mandate without federal assistance. It is unclear where the time and resources and person power will come from to implement this new law,” Bennion said. “It would be a significant administrative hurdle for election officials nationwide.”
The Associated Press contributed.
