House Speaker Mike Johnson unveiled legislation to stop illegal immigrants and noncitizens from voting in federal elections since Democrats are trying to skirt laws preventing such ballot moves.
Mr. Johnson, Louisiana Republican, first teased the measure in April when he flew to former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago compound in Florida.
The measure and Mr. Johnson’s messaging echo the ex-president’s claims that large amounts of illegal immigrants voted in the 2020 election and are unraveling the integrity of America’s elections.
“There is currently an unprecedented and a clear and present danger to the integrity of our election system,” Mr. Johnson said Wednesday. “And that is the threat of noncitizens and illegal aliens voting in our elections.”
The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE Act, would amend a law from 1993 to make people provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote. A law in 1996 already prevents people without citizenship, including illegal immigrants, from voting in federal elections.
The new law would also require that election officials share information with the Department of Homeland Security and Social Security Administration to determine whether voters are indeed eligible.
If the agencies find that they aren’t, election officials would have to remove the noncitizens from voter rolls.
Mr. Johnson admitted that knowing how many people who are not American citizens are voting in federal elections was an “unanswerable problem,” but the new bill could rectify the issue.
“We all know, intuitively, that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections,” the speaker said. “But it’s not been something that is easily provable. We don’t have that number.”
Mr. Johnson was flanked at the Capitol by Trump White House luminaries who challenged the results of the 2020 election, including former Department of Homeland Security official Ken Cuccinelli and former advisers Stephen Miller and Cleta Mitchell.
“Wherever they are, wherever they may be, whatever the plan is to try to manipulate this year’s election with illegals voting in our elections, this bill is essential to make sure that we put a stop to that,” Ms. Mitchell said.
Mr. Miller, who was in the thick of President Trump’s immigration policy, has said voting by noncitizens is as simple as checking a box.
He said Wednesday, “If this bill does not become law, then Joe Biden and Democrats will have engineered one of the greatest interferences in any democratic nation in the history of the world.”
Democrats seem unlikely to support the bill in the Senate. The Washington Times reached out to Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat, on whether he would allow a vote on the legislation should it pass the GOP-led House.
Rep. Chip Roy, a co-author of the legislation, said that if lawmakers supported the ban on noncitizen and illegal immigrant voting in 1996 on a bipartisan basis, the same should be true today.
“This is very simple,” said Mr. Roy, Texas Republican. “Should only citizens vote in the United States of America in federal elections? We’re going to call the question and we’ll see where they land.”