SAVE Act would make voting harder for spouses who changed names
The SAVE Act aims to keep non-citizens from voting, but also could make it more difficult for married people to cast their vote.
At a recent town hall in the exurbs of Atlanta, Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Ga., faced a torrent of criticism from a woman who accused him of sponsoring legislation that would make it more difficult for married women like her to vote.
She was talking about the Republican-backed Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, known as the SAVE Act. Clips of the town hall, where the woman told McCormick the bill was “voter suppression,” have since gone viral on social media.
If enacted, the proposed law would require people to present proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, when they register to vote in federal elections. It’s designed to keep undocumented immigrants from voting, though it is already illegal and exceedingly rare for noncitizens to do so.
The bill was first introduced last year by Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas. It passed the Republican House but was never taken up for a vote in the closely divided Senate. Roy re-introduced the bill in January and, though it is likely to pass the House, it will again face an uphill battle in the Senate, where a handful of Democrats would need to support the measure.
The bill doesn’t explicitly mention married women. But critics warn that its documentation requirements could impede the ability of people who have changed their name, including married women who took their husband’s last name, to register to vote.
How would the SAVE Act impact U.S. Citizens?
Under the Republican proposal, common forms of identification, including a driver’s license, would become insufficient for voter registration because they don’t prove citizenship. Real ID licenses in most states indicate someone’s legal status, but do not show whether they are a U.S. citizen or green card holder.
Instead, the bill would require those registering to vote to either present a valid passport or a photo ID that matches the name on their birth certificate or naturalization card.
Only about half of U.S. citizens have a passport, according to the U.S. Department of State.
Voting rights advocates have expressed concern that people who have changed their name and who do not have passports could run into roadblocks in the process of registering to vote, because the name on their ID likely no longer reflects the name on their birth certificate.
About 79% of women in opposite-sex marriages take the name of their spouse, according to a 2023 study by Pew Research, whereas most married men – 92% – keep their own last name.
Celina Stewart, CEO of the League of Women Voters of the United States, told USA TODAY that she hopes lawmakers will recognize the problems the bill could cause for married women, as well as trans people who change their name, and adjust it accordingly before putting it to a vote.
Roy rejected accusations that the bill could impact married women, calling this “absurd armchair speculation,” in a statement.
He said the legislation provided “a myriad ways for people to prove citizenship and explicitly directs States to establish a process for individuals to register to vote if there are discrepancies.” His office did not immediately respond to questions about whether they planned to amend the bill to account for the criticism.
In another statement provided by Roy’s office, Cleta Mitchell, founder of the conservative Only Citizens Vote Coalition, defended the bill saying that married women must provide their birth certificate and marriage certificate to get their name changed on all their documents.
“It is a pain, but millions of women do it every day,” she suggested.
Bill’s ambiguity is paramount concern
The bill does include a provision ordering states to allow registrants to provide “additional documentation” to prove their citizenship when discrepancies arise.
Still, voting rights advocates have argued that the language in the text is ambiguous and does not specify what types of documents states could accept. It would be up to the individual states, for instance, to decide whether a marriage certificate could be used to prove citizenship.
Stewart told USA TODAY she was most concerned that states wouldn’t be able to work out which additional documents they would accept until after elections happening this year and potentially, next year. Several states will hold pivotal off-year election races, including Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial races as well as major mayoral contests in New York and Pennsylvania.
“States can obviously do more to make it more easily accessible, but the federal government should have to make sure that voting is still accessible,” she said.
Further compounding the issue, advocates have argued, is a provision in the bill that would subjects election workers to potential incarceration if they accidentally register a voter who fails to present proper documentation of citizenship.
The provision, advocates warn, could make election workers less likely to accept documents that prove a person is a citizen despite their name change.
“These are people in our community who are running elections, often as volunteers,” Stewart said. “The idea that we would be threatening these people with jail time because the federal government failed to do what they were supposed to do, which is provide clarity in this law … it is so egregious.”