Veterans Accessibility Advisory Committee Act of 2025

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1057 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Last night, the Rules Committee met and produced a rule providing for consideration of four pieces of legislation. The rule provides for consideration of S. 1383, the SAVE America Act, under a closed rule with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on House Administration or their respective designees and provides for one motion to commit.

The rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 2189, the Law- Enforcement Innovate to De-Escalate Act, under a closed rule with 1 hour of debate equally divided among and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary and the Committee on Ways and Means or their respective designees and provides for one motion to recommit.

The rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 261, the Undersea Cable Protection Act of 2025, under a closed rule with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources or their respective designees and provides for one motion to recommit.

The rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 3617, the Securing America's Critical Mineral Supply Act, under a closed rule with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce or their respective designees and provides for one motion to recommit.

Further, the rule provides same-day authority through Friday, February 13, for a rule providing for consideration of a continuing resolution related to the Department of Homeland Security funding.

Mr. Speaker, as the House of Representatives works to deliver on the critical issues our Nation faces, we urge our colleagues today to prioritize the passage of S. 1383, the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or the SAVE America Act, which builds upon the SAVE Act introduced in previous Congresses that requires States to obtain proof of citizenship for Federal elections, ensuring only U.S. citizens are voting in those elections. In addition, the SAVE America Act requires individuals to present a valid photo identification before voting.

Our Founders set forth our electoral processes 250 years ago based upon the simple and ultimate principle that only Americans should vote. However, in this age of progressive, suicidal empathy, basic concepts such as voter ID and proof of citizenship have been attacked as suppression.

Let's consider the facts.

Fact one: Under the previous administration, the Biden-Harris- Mayorkas administration, some 10 million or more illegal aliens poured into communities across our country, adding to an existing foreign-born population, which totals upward of over 50 million people or close to 16 percent.

Fact two: While only U.S. citizens are legally eligible to vote in Federal elections, Federal law actually interferes with and prevents States from using Federal data to check their voter rolls to ensure that only citizens are voting, such that we end up in the upside-down situation where a State like Arizona has two different sets of systems, one for State and local and one for Federal.

Fact three: This is a recipe for fraud and a recipe for having people vote who shouldn't be voting. It undermines people's confidence in our electoral system. When combined with the fact that several jurisdictions offer driver's licenses and other benefits to illegal aliens and other foreign nationals, it provides opportunity for noncitizens to register to vote.

Fact four: Polling data is overwhelmingly in support of the SAVE America Act and its principles, that only American citizens should vote, and that we should use voter identification when we go to vote. Polling indicates that over 70 percent of Democrats across this country, over 90 percent of Republicans, and well over 70 percent of virtually every ethnicity and ethnic group in the country--Black Americans, Hispanic Americans, White Americans, men, women, rural, urban--overwhelmingly support voter identification and ensuring that only citizens vote.

Fact five: We passed the SAVE Act in the previous, preceding Congress. We passed the SAVE Act in this Congress focusing on citizenship. We now bring the SAVE America Act forward that adds voter identification, which is, again, overwhelmingly popular.

The SAVE Act passed on a bipartisan basis. Democrats joined with us in the previous Congress. Democrats joined with us in this Congress. In both instances, the House of Representatives affirmed that only U.S. citizens should vote in Federal elections.

Let's add voter ID to it. Let's pass the SAVE America Act. Let's send it over to the Senate and let the Senate move this legislation to the President's desk.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, that was a whole lot of words to say my Democratic colleagues don't want only citizens to vote and don't like voter ID.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Clyde).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am about to yield 2 minutes to my friend from Arizona, but I will just note that, as one of the lead sponsors of the legislation to deal with prohibiting Members of Congress from engaging in the act of trading in stocks, we are working on a bipartisan basis. We have legislation we are going to move. There will be a time to do that, and this is a complete substitute. In other words, this is fake.

It is a bunch of drama because my colleagues on the other side of the aisle do not want voter identification to be used to vote, and they do not want to guarantee that only citizens vote. It is that simple.

Mr. Speaker, we will deal with stock trading. I am one of the lead sponsors of that legislation. We will get it done but not as a substitute for what 80 percent of American people want, which is to guarantee only citizens vote and that they show up with a voter identification.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Biggs).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer).

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time is remaining.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud that this administration is relieving the devastating costs on the American people by creating economic growth and undoing a lot of the damage of the previous administration. We are seeing that on a daily basis.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is simply incorrect with respect to the amount of evidence that has mounted over people who are voting and should not be. The record is replete. In one example, ICE arrested criminal illegal alien Ian Andre Roberts, who was serving as the Des Moines, Iowa, school district superintendent at the time of his arrest. After his arrest, it was found that Roberts was a registered voter in Maryland despite his illegal immigration status and long criminal record. It was a criminal record filled with narcotics trafficking, driving vehicles he shouldn't have been driving, unauthorized possession of a firearm, and other crimes.

Yet we act like this isn't occurring. I have dozens of other examples right here of arrests that have been occurring this year.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Jack).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I note that a couple of things that are important for the American people to see is that this administration has driven unemployment down to historic lows. Economic growth is now back up to close to 4 percent, we believe, in the fourth quarter, and we get those numbers at the end of February.

We are seeing, importantly, a massive surge in employment among American citizens. That is among native-born American citizens. The fact is that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle don't care about that. They don't want to ensure that we are protecting American citizens. They don't want to have voter identification, and they don't want to ensure that only citizens vote in American elections.

That is what this is about. It is pretty simple.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Cline).

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the article referred to by the gentleman from Virginia be included in the Record.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the time remaining.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from South Carolina (Mrs. Biggs), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, I would note that when the gentleman from Massachusetts tries to dismiss the supposed trivial or anecdotal or cherry-picked cases, there are so many that it would take me more time than I have to read through them all of prosecutions for voter fraud and individual instances of voter fraud.

We have one here of Angelica Maria Francesco in Alabama in 2024, an illegal alien charged by Federal authorities with nine criminal counts in connection with her fraudulent assumption of the identity of a U.S. citizen, including voter fraud.

We have Alford Nelson, as known as Alford Samuels, in Florida in 2024. Alford Nelson was known as Alford Samuels, among several other aliases. He was charged by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in Broward County with two felony counts of voting as an unqualified elector. Nelson, illegal alien, unlawfully voted by mail.

I can keep on going on and on and keep going down the list. It is real. The only thing that we are putting forward is a common sense proposal to ensure that only citizens vote in American elections and that we provide voter ID at the polls.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Kennedy).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer), my friend.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Alabama, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle made a number of claims about this legislation. With respect to the gentleman's question, I would tell you that what we are talking about with respect to voter identification is simply a presentation of voter identification.

Thirty-six States already have voter identification requirements. To the extent that we are able to get this passed, as I hope we will and signed into law in the next month or two, we will have the ability that States can immediately be able to implement voter identification, present true voter ID. That is it, present it.

With respect to the other claims, claims about the implications for married women, the fact is that the SAVE America Act does not, as is alleged, disenfranchise voters but, rather, it provides a very specific process for anyone who changes his or her name to register to vote, including by signing an affidavit.

We believe the original form of the SAVE Act would have provided ample ability for States to have taken care of it, but we went ahead and added an additional provision to ensure that the affidavit process was there for the small fraction of the population it might have impacted. We wanted to ensure there was no chance of issues.

Questions were raised about our uniformed personnel, our men and women who serve this country overseas. We believe our previous version would have made it fine for them to be able to do what they needed to do to register to vote and vote, but we made a clarification to ensure that UOCAVA governs what happens with our men and women in uniform. We have made every attempt to work to ensure that this bill is doing exactly what it is intended to do, which is ensure that only citizens vote and that we present voter ID at the polls.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Georgia, (Mr. Palmer).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I would just like to offer, as I have done already, a number of examples, numerous other examples, of individuals committing fraud.

Laura Janeth Garza in Texas, a Mexican citizen, pled guilty to two felony charges of voter impersonation and ineligible voting. Garza stole the identity of her cousin, a U.S. citizen.

Another example is that of Mario Obdulio Orellana in Texas, a 57- year-old El Salvadoran national, who was indicted by the Department of Justice on Federal immigration and voter fraud violations.

Now, I could go down and give more and more examples. The fact is, yes, these are good examples in which we have been able to intervene and stop this voter fraud and identify the individuals and prosecute those individuals.

However, we know that there is significant additional fraud going on that we are not capturing and that we are not catching. There is a very simple and basic premise of those who have been in a prosecutorial function, which is that you only catch so many people. In this case, we have been going after some individuals, but we can certainly prevent any further abuse of our voter elections. Making sure that we have integrity in those elections is to make sure we have voter identification and ensure that only citizens are voting.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close if the gentleman from Massachusetts is prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Massachusetts said that we are just doing this legislation because we are afraid of losing this election.

The fact of the matter is we are not. We want to ensure that we win this election by getting the votes of American citizens and not noncitizens. It is pretty simple.

I would note that the gentleman dismisses as trivial, or as the process working, the examples that we have given in the Record of the countless times where individuals have engaged in voter fraud and they have been caught and prosecuted. I would also like to point out that they were caught after they voted. That is the problem.

The core issue here is a very simple one. We all agree Americans overwhelmingly believe by polls and by all indication that only American citizens should vote in American elections. We currently have a problem. We even have problems where noncitizens sometimes don't know they are doing something wrong.

We should be very clear: When you register to vote, you are a citizen. When you show up to vote, you present voter identification. That is all that we do.

Mr. Speaker, in a few minutes, I will offer an amendment to the rule. The amendment will make a technical correction to the manager's amendment to reflect the intent.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 45 seconds to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to amend the pending resolution with an amendment that I have placed at the desk.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution, as amended.

Mr. President, 250 years ago--actually, 250 years ago this summer--we wrote a letter to good King George III, and in that letter we now call the Declaration of Independence, we complained about foreign intervention into the activities of Americans, the colonists. We wanted the right to be able to actually control our own destiny. We wanted the ability to be able to speak for our own future, decide for our own families, without having foreign interference coming across an ocean to be able to affect us. We determined that we wanted to run our own Nation.

Now, 250 years later, we still want to run our own Nation. We want to make our own decisions without foreign interference, without anyone stepping in and telling us, as Americans, whom we are going to be and what we are going to do. We disagree with each other enough; we don't need individuals from the outside coming in and expressing their opinion. We handle this as Americans, and the way that we do that is with elections.

Elections have been routinely done through the history of our country since our Constitution was ratified in 1789. It has been a distinguishing mark of the United States. We are the oldest functioning constitutional democracy in the world. And in our Republic, we choose representatives. Those representatives speak on our behalf. And if we decide we don't like them for whatever reason, we choose different representatives. But we, as Americans, choose our own path through our own elected officials. That is what we do, and we do it on a regular, consistent basis.

Now, in the earliest days, it was literally a wooden box and slips of paper. We have improved that over the years. Step by step, decade after decade, we have done elections a little bit differently.

Now, they are done differently all over the country on it, but we have some basic foundational rules that are also guidance. We choose our own leaders, but we do it the right way.

It wasn't always that way. But as we have improved, we make our elections more transparent, better, with faster responses, giving more trust.

Many folks in my generation will never forget the photograph of staring at a hanging chad from the Bush election, with a person in an election board closely staring through a magnifying glass to try to figure out if there was a dimple on a piece of paper.

There is no election system in the country that does chads anymore because we all determined that is a terrible idea. It is just a bad way to be able to prove the intent of a vote. And the whole younger generation has no idea what a hanging chad would even be because we no longer do that anymore.

We protect the right of all individuals to vote--every American citizen--because in the middle of the 1960s, we as a Nation passed the Voting Rights Act, determining that every person in America has the right to be able to vote and that would be protected, that if there would be any jurisdiction in the country that would violate that, a Federal court could literally step in and just say: No, every single citizen of the country would have a protected right to vote.

In fact, if you want me to read it to you, the Voting Rights Act actually begins with this simple statement:

All citizens of the United States who are otherwise

qualified by law to vote at any election by the people, in

any State, Territory, district, county, city, parish,

township, school district, municipality, or other territorial

subdivision, shall be entitled and allowed to vote.

But the simple statement that the Voting Rights Act begins with-- ``All citizens''--what is interesting is the Voting Rights Act protected the ability of a court to step in and say, if some citizen is not being allowed to vote, the courts can step in and mandate that that actually occur. But it did not set up a way to say: Are you a citizen at all?

It was just assumed that only citizens would actually be the ones to vote. It is the baseline of the civil rights in that time period and in the Voting Rights Act--that our elections would be protected only for citizens. But this is a ``trust'' bill in that way, and there is no ``verify.''

What we as Republicans have brought--we have brought out of the House and brought to the floor of the Senate--is not a ``trust'' bill. It is a ``trust and verify'' bill. It takes the next step from the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which mandated that it would only be citizens that would vote.

In fact, there was a penalty actually established that if you are a noncitizen, you get up to 5 years in prison if you vote in a Federal election. That is a big deal.

The challenge is, we have no way to be able to track it. That doesn't actually occur anymore. So we want to just be able to bring a most basic thing that all Americans can agree on--we would hope--that only citizens of the United States would be able to vote, and that before you register to vote, we would have some way to be able to show you actually are a citizen. That is, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 said that all of those American citizens have a protected right to be able to vote, and they can choose to--hopefully, they do--or not. That is up to them as an American.

So let me walk through this.

The first thing I wanted to be able to say is thank you to the State election board folks and all the State election officials and the poll workers that work for every election all across the country. We lose track of this at times.

It takes almost three-quarters of a million people just to run a Federal election--three-quarters of a million. Those are poll workers. Those are poll watchers. Those are State election officials. Those are folks that work behind the scenes in every county and parish, in cities and municipalities all across the country--three-quarters of a million people just to be able to pull together an election.

Those folks are incredibly important to be able to protect the most basic rights of individuals to be able to vote and to protect the basic right of one person, one vote.

Let me share this with this body. Here is how we do it in Oklahoma. In Oklahoma, we have one of the highest rated, secure election systems in the country--in the country. And we encourage people to come out and to vote and to participate in the entire process.

Some of the things that we choose to do is, in all of our polling locations and every time ballots are actually presented, there is always a Republican and a Democrat poll worker that is always there in every area--always--so both parties are always represented in that and so everyone can look at each other and constantly be able to check the system.

We are still old school. We do a piece of paper and a marker, and you mark your ballot. And it runs through an optical scanner, and it registers that ballot was actually fully handled. So at the end of the night, if there is any challenge at all to that ballot, we can go back to the paper ballots and actually count them by hand and be able to verify all of them, because we want to make sure, every single election, we can verify every single vote, every single time.

In fact, at the end of the night, when machines are finished, we literally print out on a piece of paper and post on the window of the election board location, wherever this was that the election was being held--we actually publicly post, at the instant the election was done that night, at 7 p.m., so that it is public information immediately how many votes were taken in this area. So if, at some point, it shows up later that it was a different number, everyone could see it.

We have full verification through the entire process.

In Oklahoma, we have voter ID at every single location, at every single vote. How do we do it? If you vote in

person and you show up to vote on election day, you pull out an ID, and you show an ID--every single person.

If you vote early, absentee--we have that all over our State in county election boards everywhere--as you walk up, you have to pull out an ID and to be able to show that ID to vote.

And if you are going to mail in your ballot, we welcome that, but you have got to show ID when you actually do it. That means actually going into a location where you can get a notary that, before you put your ballot in the mail, it shows your envelope, you show the ID, it shows on the envelope who the person is on it, and you actually have a notary to do that.

We have voter ID at every single stage. We don't allow ballot harvesting at all. We are a very, very secure system, and we are proud of that. We want every single person to be able to vote, but we want to make sure it is one person, one vote.

We occasionally still do have some folks who try to vote twice in Oklahoma. I am sure that happens in other States, as well, where they will do a request for a mail-in ballot, they will mail it in with a notary and verify that it is them, and then, on election day, they will show up and vote again.

During the last Presidential election, we had a little over 1.5 million people that showed up to vote on that. We found 2 people that double-voted in multiple counties and 27 people that actually double- voted in the same county--29 folks total that double-voted in over 1.5 million people.

By the way, we didn't ignore those 29. They were all referred for prosecution because according to Federal law--Federal law, now-- according to Federal law, it is up to 5 years in prison if you vote twice.

So we refer folks for prosecution to say we don't allow that. We are careful in how we do the balloting and the voting on this. But we have a voter ID, and we walk through the process to make sure that every person actually has that opportunity to be able to vote.

Interestingly enough, in Oklahoma, we asked a question several years ago: How many folks showed up for jury duty and, when they showed up for jury duty, were excused from the jury duty because they went before the judge and said: I am not a citizen of United States?

This happens all the time, actually, where someone comes in and says: I am not a citizen of the United States, and so I need to be excused.

They are not eligible for a jury if they are not a citizen of the United States. We had about 40 people in Oklahoma that made that claim and said: I am not a citizen of the United States.

But when we checked voter rolls, they were registered to vote--40. They were excused from jury duty but were also registered to vote.

So in Oklahoma law, do you know what we do? Anytime, in any county, if someone says, I am not a citizen of the United States in the jury duty, that now gets turned into a list. And if they are registered to vote, their registration gets purged because we are serious about only Oklahoma U.S. citizens voting in Oklahoma.

Do you know why? Because 250 years ago, we fought a war against good King George to say: We make our own decisions, not someone else outside our country. We make our own.

So we make sure that we purge our own voter rolls. In fact, that is State law, to be able to do that.

Listen, we have a very simple, straightforward proposition. It is called the SAVE America Act. The two most basic features of the SAVE America Act should not be controversial. They are simple and straightforward.

We have to verify you are an American citizen. It is already Federal law--already right now--that you have to be an American citizen. We just don't verify it. So this is the ``trust and verify'' portion of the bill. We trust you that you are an American citizen. How about we just check?

So you have to show that you are an American citizen to be able to register to vote.

The second part of it is you have to have ID to be able to vote. Again, we have done this in Oklahoma for years. This can be done and should be done, and it just shouldn't be that controversial.

I have to share, though, just as who I am as a person. Mr. President, as a personal note of privilege on this, I had to smile when I saw the title of our bill, when it started working its way through the very calm House of Representatives and was sent over to us: The SAVE America Act.

There are a lot of things that can save America, and this bill is incredibly important. It is vital that we get it done. But just as a personal privilege, can I just say: I personally believe what saves America is that more people had a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I think that would be the greatest thing ever to be able to save the nature of our country.

Our country has become incredibly divided and angry. People are mad and screaming at each other and don't even know why anymore.

Two thousand years ago, a young lawyer walked up to Jesus, and said: Rabbi, of all the teachings, of all the commandments that are out there, what is the heaviest? What is the greatest commandment?

And he said: The biggest one is to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and spirit.

And then he said: You didn't ask me for two, but let me give you the second one. The second one is just like the first one--he said--to love your neighbor as yourself.

If we are going to save America, protecting our voting integrity is incredibly important, and let's get that done. But if we are really going to save America--not just a bill--I think we need to get back to the most basic truth, to restart again and ask ourselves, as individuals that make up a nation, if we are going to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love our neighbor as ourself.

And as the old joke says, when the person says, ``Who is my neighbor?'' the response is, ``probably the person you wish I wouldn't say.'' That is the person who is your neighbor.

Jesus was headed toward his execution. He knew it, but the people around him didn't. And he was heading through Jericho, and as he approached Jericho, there was a tax collector there. His name was Zacchaeus. He was up in a tree because he was a little guy and because he wanted to see Jesus come by.

Now, he was a wretched guy who had stolen from everybody in town, and everybody knew it. When Jesus saw this wretched guy, he looked at him and he said: Why don't you come down? I want to spend some more time with you.

And the one person in town that everybody thought Jesus would ignore, Jesus actually pointed him out and said: I want to spend more time with you.

At the end of the conversation, everybody looked at him and said: Why did you spend time with that broken, depraved person?

Jesus responded: Because I came to seek and to save what was lost. That is why.

Just a personal privilege, if we are going to talk about saving America, maybe we should start with our own souls.

But in the meantime, as we contemplate that as individuals, why don't we just do the most basic thing? Why don't we verify that only American citizens are voting--because we all know it is happening, and I just told you stories from my own State.

Why don't we just verify, as we go through the polls, to increase the trust of all Americans for our election process? I am looking forward to the debate on the floor this week and for folks to have the opportunity to be able to talk this through. This is something important that we need to be able to finish, and it is something strongly the American people are supportive of.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, later this year, American citizens across the country will exercise one of their most valuable and sacred rights: the right to vote--a right that has been hard-earned and fought for from the founding generation of our Republic to today.

How was the right to self-government, the right to vote secured? It was secured by American colonists who rejected the royal edict and hurled tea into Boston Harbor, declaring ``no taxation without representation.'' It was secured by ordinary men who seized their muskets and fired the shot heard around world at Lexington and Concord. It was secured by Continental troops who marched to the fields of Saratoga and the coastline of Yorktown, repeating those immortal worlds of Patrick Henry: ``Give me liberty or give me death.''

For nearly 250 years, Americans have cast their votes for leaders at every level--from local officials, to State representatives, to the President of the United States. Every Member of this body is here today because we were elected fairly and honestly and given a mandate by our constituents to serve them here in Washington and to protect the liberties and freedoms our Founders fought to preserve.

The power of the ballot box determines the course of our Nation, the history we are writing, and the freedoms we continue to defend. And while no single ballot in isolation may seem decisive, together, the votes of the American people shape the course of our Nation and the course of history.

But it is worth remembering that our voting system did not begin as it exists today. When this Nation was founded, the right to vote was limited, and over time, through debate, sacrifice, a bloody Civil War, and constitutional amendment, the right to vote was quite properly expanded. The 15th Amendment prohibited denying the vote based on race. The 19th Amendment guaranteed women the right to vote. The 26th Amendment lowered the voting age to 18. At every stage of our constitutional amendment process, the goal was the same: to ensure that the right to vote belonged to American citizens and that it was exercised with integrity.

While our system has evolved, one principle has remained constant: Elections reflect the will of the American people. For a right so sacred, for a privilege so hard fought, it is shocking, it is tragic how neglected and vulnerable the protection of our elections has become.

That is why I am here today on this very floor urging the Members of this body to pass the SAVE America Act. It says that when you register to vote in a Federal election, you must provide proof that you are a citizen of the United States and you must provide photo ID to vote. In simple terms, that is it.

This is not some radical, politicized, or weaponized piece of legislation designed to restrict Americans from voting; it is a commonsense measure that protects the integrity of our elections by ensuring that American citizens and only American citizens are voting in them.

Legitimacy in a democracy rests on two pillars: first, the mechanical integrity of the system to produce a valid result, and second, the public's confidence in that system. If either one fails, the system falters. If both fail, the system collapses. A system that cannot be trusted is a system that cannot govern.

If you look around the world, between two-thirds and three-quarters of countries require some form of identification to vote. Why? Because it safeguards the integrity of their elections and reinforces public trust in their system.

So it begs the question: Why hasn't the United States fully embraced this standard?

Well, for the last several months, we have heard claim after claim about how this legislation would somehow inhibit people from voting, that requiring identification is discriminatory, and that the American people do not support voter ID.

Our Democrat colleagues are fond of bellowing into the TV cameras that photo ID to vote is Jim Crow--they tell us with mock earnestness. Now, I will admit our Democrat colleagues should be experts in Jim Crow because it was Democrat politicians who passed the Jim Crow laws. It was Democrat politicians who founded the Ku Klux Klan. It was Democrat politicians, decade after decade, who enforced discrimination, separate-but-equal poll taxes, and a host of other laws designed to prevent African Americans from voting.

But do you know who has rejected their disingenuous claim that a photo ID to vote is Jim Crow? The Supreme Court of the United States-- the Supreme Court of the United States.

The State of Indiana passed a photo ID law requiring that you show a photo ID to vote, and a group of leftwing plaintiffs filed litigation challenging that. The case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

At the time, I was the solicitor general of the State of Texas. I led a coalition of States before the Supreme Court defending photo ID to vote, and the leftwing plaintiffs made the same argument that our Democrat colleagues make today--that requiring a photo ID to vote would somehow disenfranchise minorities.

The Supreme Court, by a vote of 6 to 3, rejected their argument. The author of the majority opinion was John Paul Stevens. John Paul Stevens was one of the great liberals on the Court. He was not a conservative. He was not of the rightwing. He was the leading liberal for years on the U.S. Supreme Court. He rejected that claim, and he pointed out that when someone votes illegally, they are stealing the votes of legal voters; they are stealing the votes of American citizens. The Supreme Court explained that when photo ID laws have been implemented, minority participation in the election goes up, not down, and the Supreme Court explained that requiring photo ID enhances the integrity of an election and the integrity of democracy.

Now, our Democrat colleagues don't want to acknowledge any of those facts, and I guess it is understandable because the American people have heard their specious arguments, and they have rejected them. Eighty-one percent of Americans support requiring a photo ID to vote.

But my Democrat colleagues might say: What about African Americans? Well, about three-quarters of African Americans in the United States support requiring a photo ID to vote.

How about Hispanics? More than 80 percent of Hispanics in America support requiring a photo ID to vote.

How about Democrats? Here is an astonishing statistic: If you get out of elective office and you ask a Democrat

on the street, 70 percent of Democrats in America support requiring a photo ID to vote.

The one group that doesn't is elected Democrats in the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House.

By the way, the premise of their argument that minorities, if you require a photo ID to vote, are not going to be able to vote is, frankly, insulting.

I am proud to be an Hispanic American. I have been Hispanic all my life. Do you know what I have in my wallet? I have a driver's license. I look at my colleagues across the way, and I feel confident they have driver's licenses in their wallets as well.

Hispanics are not morons. African Americans are not morons. When you claim minorities can't figure out how to get a driver's license--well, gosh, what do you need a photo ID to do right now in America? You need a photo ID to purchase alcohol or to purchase tobacco. You need a photo ID to gamble or to purchase lottery tickets. You need a photo ID to go into a bar. You need a photo ID to get on a plane. You need a photo ID to rent a car. You need a photo ID just to drive a car--not even to rent a car but to drive a car. You need a photo ID to apply for government benefits. You need a photo ID to enroll in college. You need a photo ID to open a bank account. You need a photo ID to check into a hotel. And--I have to admit this is my personal favorite--you need a photo ID--actually two photo IDs--to shovel snow in New York City. These are routine, everyday activities.

The Gallery is full. I feel confident everyone in the Gallery who is not a child has a driver's license. By the way, you wouldn't be admitted to the Gallery if you didn't. And I feel confident every Member of this Chamber has done just about anything I listed--well, except shoveling snow. I am not convinced many of my colleagues have shoveled snow, although they do shovel other things.

The question is not whether Americans are bright enough to obtain a photo ID. We know they can, and we know they do. The real question is, Why would we not require the same level of verification for something as consequential and vital as voting? Are our Democrat colleagues saying voting doesn't matter or is it something else?

Voting is not just another everyday activity; it rolls around every year or few years, and it is the vehicle that protects the principles of our Republic. It is safeguarding what matters.

This legislation is necessary because there are individuals and systems that can undermine confidence in our elections if proper safeguards are not in place. One of the most apparent ways that we have seen is through the masses of illegal immigrants that our Democrat colleagues let in through open borders for over 4 years.

During the Biden administration, more than 12 million illegal immigrants flooded into this country--the vast majority through my home State of Texas. Now, understand that was not an accident. That was not something the Democrats could not stop. That was their desired outcome. How do we know that? Because the instant President Trump was sworn into office for his second term, illegal border crossings plummeted 99 percent overnight.

The Democrats said: No, Joe Biden can't secure the border. He needs new legislation.

We now know that was a lie. It was objectively false, and they knew it was false.

Well, if they could have secured the border for 4 years, they chose not to. They chose to let murderers into this country. They chose to let rapists into this country. They chose to let child molesters into this country. They chose to let gang bangers into this country. They chose to let terrorists into this country. We have had four radical Islamic terror attacks in the last 2 weeks.

Why would the Democrats choose to allow more than 12 million illegal aliens to invade this country? I am going to suggest the obvious reason: because the Democrats look at those illegal aliens and they want them to cast a vote for Democrats in Federal elections.

Why are the Democrats lined up and saying: No. No. No. Under no circumstances should we test to see if you are an American citizen. Under no circumstances should we require photo IDs.

There was one activist a few years ago who filmed himself going into a DC polling place.

The DC polling place said: Sir, what is your name?

He said: My name is Eric Holder.

Now, this activist was not the Attorney General of the United States at the time, but yet DC handed him a ballot and said: Mr. Holder, please cast your vote.

The Democrats are lined up in this Chamber because they want our elections to be insecure; they want voter fraud to be rampant and to be easy.

Ask yourself: Do the American people have a difficult time buying a beer? Do they have a difficult time getting into an R-rated movie? Do they have a difficult time getting on an airplane? Well, yes, because the Democrats have refused to fund the TSA, so there are long lines right now. But the lack of a photo ID is not an impediment that stops people from flying.

This debate is about something very simple: Do our elections matter? Does our democracy matter?

And, boy, I have got to say that that is a phrase the Democrats love--that they are defending democracy. It is interesting that their voices usually drop an octave when they say that. They clutch their pearls--and that is just the men. ``Defending democracy'' is what they say.

Ask yourself: Why are they not concerned at all about the 12 million illegals whom they let into this country voting illegally? I will submit that Occam's razor provides that the simplest solution is usually the right one. The simplest solution is very clear: The Democrats in this body want illegals to vote. They want power enough that they are more than happy to undermine democracy to try to seize power. I get that from their personal self-interest, but it is not in the interest of the men and women they represent; it is not in the interest of the people of America.

This bill is rightly called the SAVE America Act. If we were voting on the merits of what was good for America, what was good for democracy, and what was good for American citizens, the vote would be 100 to nothing.

Although I would note that on the other side of this building, at the State of the Union Address that the Presiding Officer was at and that I was at, we saw why our Democrat colleagues are so adamantly opposed to this bill. President Trump turned to the Democrats on the right side of the floor of the House, and he gave them an opportunity to demonstrate with absolute clarity.

He said: If you agree our first priority should be to fight for American citizens and not for illegal aliens, please stand.

Every single Democrat in Congress remained seated.

I would note, as we are on the floor today, of the 47 Democrats in this body, only 1 is here on the floor, but a whole lot more were on the floor during the State of the Union, and every one of them chose to remain seated because they could not support the statement that we need to support American citizens and not illegal aliens. That is why they oppose the SAVE America Act. It is because they want to be handed power over this country by the illegal aliens they let into this country.

That is why we need to save America, and it is why I urge every Member of this body to pass the SAVE America Act.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, let me, first of all, thank my colleague and friend the Senator from New Jersey who, I think, has brought us a fresh voice, has incredible energy, and is somebody who has a history of working extraordinarily well on national security issues.

I agree with virtually everything he just said in that this is a bit of a distraction. I think part of the reason it is a distraction is that, at the end of the day, this President has frankly refused to acknowledge that the American people's will in 2020 was not to rehire him. He cannot accept the legitimate outcome of the 2020 election. Despite officials from his own administration calling the 2020 election the most secure in American history, the President continues to promote unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud, and that is after investigations from multiple courts and the States' attorneys general and election officials from both parties strongly declaring that there was no evidence to support allegations of substantial fraud. Simply put, the 2020 election was certified, litigated, and affirmed.

Tomorrow, we are going to hear from some of the intelligence officials as our committee takes on the worldwide threat assessment where, unfortunately, senior intelligence officials seem to be still focusing on relitigating the 2020 election rather than making us safe for 2026 and 2028 because the truth is, after all of these years, the President and his allies haven't been able to find any evidence of legitimate voter fraud in past elections. As a matter of fact, there have been studies ad nauseam that show millions and hundreds of millions of votes and that the number of people who were undocumented and voted by mistake were in the single digits.

Now, they are looking forward to the effort that is on the floor right now toward suppressing and wrongfully influencing future elections through this so-called SAVE America Act.

Again, I know the Presiding Officer and my friend from Wisconsin and others are going to say I am going to go over the top, so let me just use the President's own words. The Presiding Officer comes from Utah, which has a proud history of States' rights and local control, but in the President's own words, he wants Republicans to ``take over'' election administration, going so far as to say Republicans ought to nationalize the voting. If there were ever an ``Alice in Wonderland up is down and down is up,'' that is what is happening.

Again, I don't know if this comment led to her firing, but before he fired her, the President's DHS Secretary Kristi Noem pushed for the passage of the SAVE America Act while stating that her goal was to have the right people voting so we can elect the right leaders. I mean, this sounds like it comes out of some dystopian novel or 1930s advocacy. I just don't get it. We all know that the strength of our democracy depends on voter participation and access to the ballot box. I have been doing this, I guess, long enough that I remember when things like ``motor voter'' and ``let's make it easier to register'' were all bipartisan.

Unfortunately, contrary to the name the SAVE America Act, this legislation undermines the very foundations that it claims to protect. This bill would impose sweeping requirements that would make it extremely difficult for eligible voters to participate in our democracy. New voters, married women, and servicemembers would face additional hurdles when registering to vote. That is because, under the SAVE America Act, Americans who have voted for years and have had no question about their citizenship would have to go back and provide documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote in Federal elections.

Let me say, at the front end, that I support voter ID. We have voter ID in Virginia. I don't think you should be able to vote without showing a legitimate ID, but under this bill, that so-called reasonable policy would put in place requirements that are so stringent that it would mean if you don't have access to the right documentation, like a passport, you wouldn't be able to vote for the President of the United States.

The truth is, according to the U.S. State Department, only half of all Americans possess a passport. That means, if this bill passes, half of all American citizens would not be able to provide one of the primary acceptable forms of documentation that would be required to vote under the SAVE Act.

Additionally, under this bill, States would be barred from accepting online and mail-in voter registrations unless the applicant also presented proof of citizenship in person. So this is somebody who made the choice to change their name who is now 85 years old and who has to go back and find a birth certificate or get a passport and has to show up in person to kind of get registered again, even though she has been voting for the last 50 years with no question about her citizenship.

This effectively, frankly, guts the online and mail-in voter registration processes that are available across many States, which creates, I think, an unnecessary burden for all voters, particularly rural voters, senior citizens, and individuals with disabilities disproportionately.

I see my friend from California here. It has been States in the West, whether it is Oregon or California or Utah, that have used these tools to get more people involved. In fact, these efforts don't make our elections more secure. All this does is disenfranchise millions of eligible voters.

My view is that the goal of the SAVE Act is more about cutting out voters and suppressing the vote than it is about saving anything going forward. We are having this debate, and we are going to probably go through lots of procedural antics that most folks won't understand. I just wish that my Republican colleagues would come back to what I think we should be spending all of our time on. If we are going to spend all night, let's focus on funding the TSA, FEMA, CISA, and the Coast Guard.

Frankly, I believe we need to fund all of the folks at the Customs and Border Patrol who aren't assigned to interior immigration enforcement. So, last week, Senator Murray and Senate Democrats attempted to say: Hey, we have got to debate about ICE, and we have got to debate about some of the CBP people who are doing domestic enforcement. If we can't come to an agreement there, let's fight over that, but let's not make sure that we hold all of these other folks hostage.

Unfortunately, my Republican colleagues blocked five separate bills that were offered by Senate Democrats that would have fully funded all of the components of DHS. I think about our

hard-working TSA officers who, thank goodness, got a paycheck on March 12--a partial paycheck--but now, they are going unpaid.

The amazing thing is that this is kind of a crisis that doesn't need to be a crisis. The fact is, last July, my Republican colleagues voted to give the Department of Homeland Security a slush fund worth nearly $170 billion. Of that funding, $75 billion was a blank check to ICE, providing the Agency with a budget larger than of most global militaries. I actually think the ICE budget is now bigger than the French military's, and I know it is bigger than the FBI's budget. You know, the truth is that $75 billion could actually fund ICE for the next 7 years without any additional appropriations.

I am here today because I and my Democratic colleagues are fighting to ensure that all the funding that is used for immigration enforcement will no longer be used in inappropriate ways. I think even most of my Republican colleagues have acknowledged that what happened in Minneapolis kind of went off the rails in that we were seeing ICE agents literally abuse and brutalize Americans and disrespect basic human dignity.

The unfortunate thing is, under this administration, ICE has been turned frankly into kind of a secret police that I believe has waged enormous violence against Americans. I know in my State, that of the daily quota of people they have to pick up, 80 to 85 percent have never violated any other law other than coming into the country and most of them are going through an amnesty process that was set up. You know, we have seen the images of ICE ripping apart families and arresting moms as they drop off kids to daycare. As a matter of fact, I know that I tried to do some oversight, which is part of my job, and it took a lot of hoops to get through to even do that oversight.

I believe, because of these actions, all of our citizens are less safe. So we have got to make meaningful reforms to ICE which I don't think are outrageous, like requiring body cameras, making sure that immigration enforcement officers show their faces and identify themselves, and making sure there is proper training and upholding traditional use-of-force standards. These are the same requirements that my local law enforcement has to deal with every day and has had to for years. These aren't new. These are commonsense, basic accountability measures that, as I said, our State and local police abide by because that is how you keep communities safe.

Unfortunately, so far, the White House doesn't seem to see it that way. They continue to drag their feet on negotiations at the expense, frankly, of the TSA, FEMA, the Coast Guard, and Customs and Border Patrol--not the folks doing interior enforcement--who are not getting paid. That doesn't make any sense.

As a matter of fact, we have even seen tools where, in the last shutdown, the administration didn't decide to cut off Global Entry or TSA PreCheck because those are actually funded by separate fees, but suddenly, they decided to amp up the political pressure and close off those programs. Now, thank goodness, because of pressure from the public, the Trump administration has reversed course and restarted the Global Entry program, but it should have never been suspended in the first place. We have got to get these folks paid. Take yes for an answer. Take yes for an answer.

As I pointed out earlier, with $75 billion for ICE, it is not going to stop. We have got to get the reforms in place. So let's keep the negotiations going. We ought to get them done. I am going to make sure that the TSA agents at Dulles, at National, and at airports across my Commonwealth get their paychecks.

As a State on the ocean, I want to make sure that the Coast Guard gets their paychecks. We have been hit hard by Hurricane Helene, and I want to make sure FEMA gets funded. And CISA--the Cybersecurity Agency, which is one of the things that guards against foreign malign influence--has been decimated by this administration. As we go into an election season where I extraordinarily fear foreign interference, close to 50 percent of the personnel have been cut or eliminated.

So we can do better. We must do better.

We can debate the SAVE Act, which I think is, again, about voter disenfranchisement, not voter safety or integrity, but I do think, while we debate this, why not go ahead and take yes for an answer and fund all of the other components of DHS so those folks who help protect us day in and day out get their paychecks?

Let's reopen these critical Agencies. Let's acknowledge that ICE has a $75 billion slush fund that we could complain about as Democrats-- Democrats do--but it is the law of the land. They have the resources. In the meantime, why hold up the pay of these Americans who are doing so many things to keep us safe? I think those folks deserve better. I think we all deserve better.

I guess I am a little old-fashioned. I actually think, back to the subject at hand, you know, our elections are better if more people participate. I am welcome to having more folks participate--citizens participate. Citizens participate. Unfortunately, this SAVE Act cuts back on a whole lot of Americans that will be disenfranchised simply because, oh my gosh, they did the radical thing of changing their name when they got married; or, oh my gosh, they were willing to join our military; or, oh my gosh, they are aged and they don't want to spend 150 bucks to get a passport.

Our country deserves better.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I, too, rise in opposition to S. 1383, the so-called SAVE America Act. I think a better name--more, actually, representative of the contents of the bill--would be the ``Save Republicans From the Consequences of Their Actions Act.'' I have some other choice names for it, too, but not exactly appropriate for the Senate floor, so we will stick to the SAVE Act just to be short.

Last year, President Trump and Republicans in Congress promised the American people that they would lower costs--costs across the board but specifically healthcare costs. If you recall, just a few months ago, they promised to do something about the 15 million people that were being kicked off their health insurance when they failed to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits. They failed on that promise.

The administration's war on clean energy has driven electricity prices up 13 percent since Trump took office. So much for ``all of the above'' energy strategies. So much for energy dominance. The price of oil is up 40 percent and gasoline is up 25 percent and rising in these few short weeks since Donald Trump initiated an unauthorized war on Iran. That is the largest single-month increase in gas prices since Hurricane Katrina, just for context.

I don't need to tell you all that many people are struggling with the rising cost of rents or their mortgages while the Speaker of the House reportedly told House Republicans that the President thinks ``No one gives a [bleep] about housing.''

Well, President Trump, listen to this: 76 percent of renters and nonhomeowners, asked in a recent poll by the National Association of REALTORS, say that they don't think they will ever be able to afford to buy a house.

This Senate, at least, passed the bipartisan ROAD to Housing Act last week. If our colleagues in the House got their act together, that bill has the potential to do a whole lot of good.

In addition to healthcare and housing, Congress urgently needs to act and deliver long overdue disaster assistance for California and a number of other States and regions affected by disaster this last year.

So there are a lot of truly pressing issues for us to be focusing on and taking action on right now, but are we addressing any of those on this to-do list this week? No. Not even close.

Instead of focusing on the affordability crisis or trying to save us from endless wars, Senate Republicans are once again doing Donald Trump's bidding. This time, they are making his conspiracy-fueled election takeover bill their top priority.

Since we have launched into this debate over the bill, we have already heard all sorts of debunked lies and misinformation and misrepresentations repeated over and over again by our Republican colleagues.

Let me make a few things very clear. First of all, no, this is not a simple

voter ID bill. The latest version of the SAVE Act is a Trojan horse, actually. It is a voter suppression bill filled with poison pills and designed to change the rules of the election as we are in the middle of primary election season already and the November election is on the horizon. And for what? For partisan political gain?

The President himself has said that if this bill passes, Republicans will ``never lose a race. For 50 years, we won't lose a race.''

The lead sponsor of this bill in the Senate has stated:

Republicans will lose power--likely for a long time--if we

don't get the SAVE America Act passed.

Colleagues, it doesn't get any more obvious than that.

Here is how it works. The voter ID rhetoric is actually a bait-and- switch. The SAVE Act does not allow Americans to use their driver's licenses or other common forms of ID to register to vote. That is right. The SAVE Act does not allow Americans to use their driver's licenses or common IDs to register to vote. The SAVE Act would require a passport in order to vote--something that half of Americans don't have, not to mention the $165 it costs and a 4- to 6-week wait time to get one.

If you are one of the 148 million Americans who do not have a passport but you are otherwise eligible to vote, you will need to, what, maybe dig through the attic or call your parents to try to find your original birth certificate--that is if you still even have it.

According to 1 survey, there are an estimated 21 million people who lack access to these documents. That is a big chunk of the electorate.

If you are one of the 69 million married women who chose to change your name when you got married, tough luck. Your name doesn't match your birth certificate anymore, even if you can find the birth certificate, so now you have to jump through additional hoops and bring your birth certificate and your marriage license to the election office. That is your recourse.

Just to make this even more of a burden, the SAVE Act mandates that you bring these documents--and let me quote from the bill--``in person to the office of the appropriate election official'' and sign an affidavit. That is what the text of the bill says. As a result, millions of women are going to face additional barriers to the ballot than their spouses have to face. When does anybody have time for that? Some evening after work? Maybe on a weekend? That is assuming elections offices are open in the evenings and on the weekends. So more than likely, someone is going to have to take time off from work to register to vote or renew their registration.

What does the SAVE Act mean in practice if, Heaven forbid, this passed and was signed into law? Bottom line: It is the complete elimination of voter registration as we have known it for decades. The voter registration drives we see in communities and on college campuses--gone. Online voter registration or mailing in a voter registration card--which you sign under penalty of perjury, by the way--gone. Motor voter--remember that element of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act that was passed with overwhelming bipartisan support of Congress creating an opportunity to register to vote when you are doing your business at the department of motor vehicles? That, too, gone or thrown into chaos.

It seems like the goal is actually very, very clear: Let's eliminate opportunities for people to register to vote and have their voices heard in the elections.

All of that was in the original SAVE Act, which, thankfully, this Senate had the good sense to not even take up, but this new version of the bill that is now before the Senate--we know it was rushed through the House of Representatives and now seems to be rushed through the Senate without a single hearing, and this version is even worse. How can it get worse? Folks, you are going to love hearing this. This bill mandates that all 50 States share their confidential voter roll information with Trump's Department of Homeland Security. That is right. Let me say that again. Every State would be required to hand over confidential voter data to Trump's Department of Homeland Security, which, by the way, does not run elections. If they have any role in elections, it is to assist State and local governments with cyber security, but they are backtracking on that responsibility.

By the way, this is the same Department of Homeland Security which has been found in violation of 200 court orders since December alone just in Minnesota alone. This is who the SAVE Act would entrust to take over voter list maintenance for every State in the Nation? For what purpose? So that political appointees of this administration can go through the lists--again, every voter in every State--and order people that were on the voter rolls to be purged from those lists.

This isn't a hypothetical, folks. The fact is they are already test- driving this power with States that are choosing to cooperate. At least 12 States have provided the full statewide voter registration lists, including driver's license information and Social Security information. They either did it voluntarily or they succumbed to the political pressure by Donald Trump. The results of this demonstration should alarm all of us.

ProPublica, the Texas Tribune, and other sources have found that, rather than identifying noncitizens on the rolls, DHS is sending back to the States false positives, directing people to be removed from the voter lists who are actually U.S. citizens and eligible to vote. That is right. This lawless and incompetent DHS is already trying to purge thousands of eligible Americans from the voter lists. If this bill were to pass, it would supercharge those efforts with actual congressional authorization.

Is that what your goal is? Is that what you intend to do? Not on my watch. Not on my watch.

But there are even more troubling provisions in this voter suppression bill. If you listen to Donald Trump or, better yet, just check the White House website, it says, and once again I quote, ``No Mail-in ballots,'' with only a few, very narrow exceptions.

So this bill would also ban no-excuse absentee voting, which is widely used in 28 States across the country. And according to reports, President Trump himself has voted by mail. Over 48 million people voted by mail in 2024. That is about one in three voters across the country-- or ballots cast across the country.

And let me be clear about something: This is not a blue State versus red State dynamic. The list of States that have used vote-by-mail include Alaska, Florida, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North and South Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

But, sadly, too many Republicans simply cannot admit that ``Emperor'' Trump has no clothes when it comes to elections.

Why are we doing this? I have to suspect that there are two primary reasons for this voter suppression effort. First, because President Trump and the agenda that this Republican majority has supported has been so bad--not just so unpopular but so harmful to American families--that they are trying to limit who can have a voice in the midterm elections.

The second, clearly, is Donald Trump's obsession with the Big Lie and his refusal to accept the fact that he lost the 2020 Presidential election. Now, we all know that, after losing the 2020 election, Donald Trump encouraged a mob of his supporters to storm this building--the U.S. Capitol--including this very Chamber, on January 6. Why? Because every single court case, every investigation and recount, confirmed the same exact thing: Donald Trump lost that election. But he felt like he needed to stop the peaceful transfer of power.

Thank God for all the officers, for the more than 15 Federal, State, and local law enforcement agencies, as well as the National Guard, who protected the Capitol that day. And I am grateful--I hope we are grateful on a bipartisan basis--that we have a plaque commemorating their heroism finally hanging in the Capitol.

But here we are, 6 years later, and Trump is as obsessed as ever with vengeance: pursuing vindictive prosecutions of his perceived enemies, seizing ballots in Georgia because I guess he is still trying to find those 11,870 votes, sending subpoenas for the 2020 Cyber Ninjas audit-- yes, the one that

found that Joe Biden won Arizona by even more votes than originally thought.

So, make no mistake, the SAVE Act isn't about protecting our elections; it is about attacking them.

As the Presiding Officer can tell, I am strongly opposed to this anti-voter bill, and I will do everything in my power to defeat it. And, no, I am not alone. Senate Democrats will fight this voter suppression bill--tooth and nail, day after day, night after night--for as long as it takes to protect our democracy.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak about something that unifies our country.

Here in the Senate, often, we talk about things we disagree on. We are going to talk today about something Americans agree on. The American people overwhelmingly want election security. They want our border to be secure. They want our elections to be secure. They want to feel that their government is acting with integrity and fairness and to have a representative government that protects its people.

I rise in support of the SAVE America Act. For many of us, this isn't a new fight. My good friend Senator Lee and I have been working to pass the SAVE America Act for years because

we know this isn't just about election security; it is about protecting the future of our Nation for all American families.

The SAVE America Act is very simple. First, you need an ID to vote. Second, you need proof of citizenship to register in our elections. These aren't controversial ideas. In fact, a vast majority of Americans, no matter their party affiliation, their race, their gender--you name it--support these ideas. Why wouldn't they? Americans want to know that our elections are both free and fair and that our democracy is safe. They believe in our country and that citizens can make good decisions. They want to know that their votes count and are not diluted by someone who is not a U.S. citizen.

Americans deserve that because this question cuts to the very core of who we are as a country. To survive, a republic needs its citizens to know and trust that their vote is secure, that their vote matters, and that they can trust the outcome. People have died for the sacred right to vote, and that sacred right should not be diluted by non-U.S. citizens.

And if Americans can't trust their elections or who is legally allowed to vote in them, then they can't trust that their elected officials actually represent them.

Yet, somehow, congressional Democrats, funded by George Soros and forever cowering to the radical left, are ignoring--they are ignoring-- the will of the American people. The minority leader tried to say this bill was a ``dagger at the heart of our democracy,'' even though the mayor of the largest city in the State he represents requires not one but two forms of ID just to shovel snow. I would say not passing this bill and allowing illegals to vote and the integrity of the election to be undermined is the real dagger.

That is why the SAVE America Act is crucial. The fact is, so much of what Democrats are saying about this bill simply--it is not true. Democrats are lying to all of us, and they know it. It is the same tired playbook they have tried time and time again.

So let's unpack their arguments. You are going to hear them say this is ``Jim Crow 2.0.'' Yep, that is right. We have once again reached the point where Democrats claim the thing that they don't like is racist.

It is wrong, it is insulting, and the Democrats know it. Everyone knows it, but they hope the American public won't notice. And here is why this is so wrong: What Democrats are really saying is that the 83 percent of Americans who support voter ID laws are all racist.

And let's remember, it was the Democrats who passed Jim Crow law, not Republicans.

Everyone who is paying attention can see what they are doing. Democrats are openly calling most of America racist, and the mainstream media acts like that is normal.

But the Democrat attacks on hard-working Americans aren't done. After they call us all racist, they double down and say: The SAVE America Act is an attack on married women.

There has been a lot of talk recently about what is fair to women in America. The Democrats have said that the SAVE America Act is bad for married women. Liberals have also claimed that biological women need to shut up and accept that biological men can compete against them, shatter their dreams--sometimes their bodies--and steal their championships. Democrats somehow say that is fair, but it is sure not fair to biological women.

And the most deranged members of the radical left have now convinced Democrats in Congress it is OK to tell little girls that God made them wrong and allow the mutilation of their bodies before these children can truly comprehend or consent to the consequences of hormone therapy or gender reassignment surgery.

Now, I am not a woman. I can confidently say that because, unlike the Democrats, I know what a woman is. And I am married to an amazing woman. We have raised two incredible, smart, and strong women who now have families of their own. They are independent and can make decisions for themselves. They don't need anyone to tell them how to run their lives. And I am lucky enough to have one little girl in my life who calls me grandpa. Even at 5, she is very comfortable telling me what to do.

While I am not a woman, I do have pieces of advice for the Democrats: One, stop telling Americans that women can't figure out how to register to vote because you want to keep illegals voting. Women are smarter than Democrats think they are, much smarter. And, two, stop destroying women's sports by telling Americans that women can physically compete with biological males.

Stop telling Americans that just because a little girl wears shorts instead of dresses and wants to hang out with the boys instead of the girls that it is OK to permanently disfigure her. It is disgusting, and every Democrat here knows it, but they are too cowardly to tell the truth to the radical lunatics running their party.

Thankfully, when we pass the SAVE America Act, we will end these dangerous attacks on women by Democrats for good.

Look around and acknowledge what the Democrats are doing. They are saying to women: Don't support the SAVE America Act. You will never figure out how to register to vote again.

Do you realize how insulting that is? Do you think I would ever look at my wife or my daughters and granddaughter and think they aren't smart enough or, in the case of my granddaughter, won't be smart enough to do what they need to do?

Now, I am not going to stand here and let Democrats in Washington claim that these amazing, strong, smart women cannot figure out how to register to vote. This is nothing but a made-up talking point from Democrats because they want to allow illegals to vote. It is real simple.

I am tired of hearing Democrats use every excuse in the book to allow illegals to vote in our election.

Now, we all know the Democrats can't win on their radical ideas, so they have to try to weaponize our elections. That is wrong.

Americans who are perfectly capable of showing their ID to board an airplane, visit a doctor's office, and prove their citizenship deserve secure elections.

We are only here today because Democrats have created a system in this country that has totally failed the American people, and Americans want secure elections. We must make sure Americans can have the faith that their vote counts and that the election results reflect the will of the people. We must put simple standards in place that a majority of Americans approve of and that will help Americans trust that our elections are free and fair.

And why wouldn't Democrats want to make certain that elections in the United States of America are free and fair? We want that for every other country in the world. Why wouldn't we want it here?

The fact is, over the last decades, Democrats' priorities are totally out of whack with what Americans want. Under the Biden administration, Democrats purposefully opened our borders, and our country was flooded by illegal aliens, the same illegal aliens that Democrats are now putting above Americans as they do everything in their power to destroy this bill.

Then when Democrats saw how enraged the American people were about their wide-open borders and all of the crime they were allowing into this country, the left claimed we needed new laws to fix it. As we all know, in the case of our border security, that was a complete lie.

But for election security, we do need new laws because the ones we have aren't strong enough. And President Trump, on his own, can't secure elections.

President Trump secured our border, and now, Congress must secure our elections.

The facts are simple: Illegal aliens should not vote in American elections. We know it is happening, and we must do everything we can to stop it.

Democrats still say it is racism, but they say everything is racism when they don't like it. Is it racist that before I board a plane, I have to show my ID? Is it racist that in order to buy certain medicines, apply for a job or a bank account, check into a hotel, rent a car, purchase a lottery ticket, order a drink at a bar, or get into the DNC convention--or shovel snow for goodness' sake--that we, as Americans, have to show ID? Absolutely not, and anyone telling you otherwise is lying.

Now here is my simple question for Democrats: Why should voting in our elections, something that dictates the direction of our country and is essential to building trust in government, have a lower ID standard than buying a six-pack of beer or a lottery ticket? The answer is simple: It shouldn't.

When the minority leader isn't calling minorities and women too stupid to show ID and register to vote, he has claimed that we can't pass this bill because President Trump is trying to rig the elections.

He is lying, and he is telling on himself. The minority leader and the Democrats think that stopping illegal aliens from voting in American elections is rigging the system. Now that is a remarkable thing for them to admit, but when they tell you who they are, we have to listen.

What is clear to me is Democrats don't think they can win. They don't think they can win unless we allow people who are not legally allowed to vote to cast a ballot.

Clearly, the minority leader is more concerned about what passing the SAVE America Act would mean for his future as majority leader than he is about election security, faith in our democracy, or delivering for the American people.

Democrats, George Soros, and the radical left will try to convince you that their opposition to this bill is about fairness and integrity; it is about protecting American democracy. Don't listen to them.

It is not fair for illegals to vote in American elections. I don't get to vote in the French elections or the British elections or the Canadian elections.

It is not fair to let men compete in women's sports. It is not fair to allow the mutilation of children with gender reassignment surgery for minors.

The fact is that fairness, integrity, and our future are on the line. It is this bill that will protect them, and it is what Senator Lee and I and so many others are fighting for today as we once again call on this body to pass the SAVE America Act. I urge my colleagues to support it.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am honored to follow my very eloquent colleague from Vermont in the common cause that brings us to the floor tonight, which is to say no--no--to a bill that so fundamentally and far-reachingly would undermine--in fact, destroy--our democracy. It may sound like an exaggeration, but it is the truth.

Republicans want you to believe that this bill is about making sure that citizens vote. Actually, it is about making sure that citizens cannot vote. Trump and the Republicans can't win on their policy decisions, so they must win by taking away the vote this November and for elections to come.

Make no mistake, this bill will take away votes from millions of Americans. Literally, it will roll back the clock on the civil rights era, on decades earlier during Reconstruction, on the Civil War itself. It will move America back in time and jeopardize our very democracy.

The simple fact is 21 million Americans do not have the requisite documentation this bill requires to register to vote. Passports are expensive. A passport book costs more than $100. And birth certificates are not readily accessible to many, many people. I have to admit, I don't know where my birth certificate is. There are many people who may not have their birth certificate at all and will have to try to track it down and then spend the money that is necessary to obtain it.

Then, for 69 million married women who have changed their name but whose documentation reflects at birth their maiden name, they will be required to provide documentary proof of citizenship plus additional documentation like a marriage certificate or they will have to sign an affidavit.

The SAVE America Act is not about saving America. If it were, it would not make it harder for service men and women, our veterans, and our military families to vote. Think of it for a moment. It fails to recognize military IDs as valid proof of citizenship.

I want to emphasize this point for a moment because I think it so epitomizes what is evil about this legislation. A military ID can grant servicemembers access to military bases; highly secure, sometimes classified and in some cases restricted facilities; but under this Republican proposal, it just isn't enough to allow those servicemembers access to the ballot box, the foundation of democracy. They go to bases. They go to restricted areas. They can go to other kinds of military facilities. But they cannot go to vote.

It imposes burdens on servicemembers abroad, including children of servicemembers. It excludes them--military voters born abroad--and it imposes burdens on servicemembers and military families stationed overseas, requiring in-person proof of citizenship at a government office in the United States when registering or updating voter registration. So in order to vote, they have to know about the law, and then they have to make a trip to a government office, probably while they are on leave with limited amounts of time. They want to be with their family, and they have to spend additional time going to a government office to register to vote. These are men and women defending our right to vote, and this bill restricts their right to vote.

The bill would also impose unacceptable barriers to voting for disabled veterans and veterans living in rural communities. It would require veterans to travel long distances simply to register or update their registration. Yet, for veterans with service-connected disabilities, mobility challenges, or limited transportation options, this requirement will create unacceptable obstacles for them to exercise their right to vote--veterans, again, who served and sacrificed for our country, who defend our rights and liberties, including the right to vote, themselves effectively being denied that right.

It is wrong. It is wrong morally. It is probably wrong constitutionally. Our servicemembers, military spouses and children, and veterans sacrifice so much for this country. It seems unfathomable and unforgivable to make it harder for the military community to vote because of one President's vanity and vengeance and political games-- and the effort to win election.

Senate Republicans make a lot of promises when it comes to our veterans and our military. They have the best rhetoric going. I want to remind them that promises are meaningless unless they are kept; words are ineffectual unless there is action to support them.

While we sit here debating a bill that will make it harder for members of the military and veterans to vote, I want to remind this body that Senate Republicans continue to block the Major Richard Star Act--a bipartisan bill to deliver combat-injured veterans their full military pension. That is right. Republicans have blocked it twice just this year.

Let's keep in mind what this legislation does and why it is supported by the vast majority of Members of Congress and the people of the United States. It says, in effect, you cannot deduct from a combat- injured retiree's pay the amount that goes to that person for disability compensation. Republicans say the cost is too high. They say it is double-dipping. Our veterans have earned both retirement pay and disability compensation. They have earned it. It is not something given to them out of charity.

They have not only blocked the passage of that bill, but they have also blocked my efforts even to allow floor consideration of it. I asked for unanimous consent twice just to give us a vote. Let that sink in. They will not even allow a vote. It wouldn't take more than 30 minutes. Let's see if we have the votes. Let's see who is going to be accountable.

We made a promise to these veterans that they would receive both retirement and disability benefits. Our legislation would deliver on that promise.

Republicans in leadership can't find the courage to give this legislation a vote despite 77 Members sponsoring it--both sides of the aisle, across the ideological spectrum. Yet they have found floor time to try to pass this mockery of a bill, to pass the SAVE America Act--a bill that will make it harder for our military and our veterans to vote.

This isn't the message we should be sending to Americans, especially amid action that is putting more troops in harm's way. What a time. American troops deployed in kinetic action, in harm's way, and the SAVE America Act has a single, simple goal: turning away American voters at the ballot box, including our military and our veterans.

We have seen this discouragement of voting time and again: sending Tulsi Gabbard to Fulton, GA, continuing the false narrative that somehow there was fraud in the Georgia vote; continuing the distorted message that there is voting fraud rampant in the Nation. The statistics and the facts prove this contention is absolutely wrong. It is false, fallacious, mistaken.

The intimidation of poll workers, the demand for voting information, private information not available to the public--all of it unjustified, probably illegal. This administration continues to pursue it because the goal is to suppress the vote.

Let's be clear. Voter suppression is the objective. This bill is the cornerstone of that vast voter suppression effort. I will give him credit for his consistency. It has been constant, the effort that President Trump is demanding of Republicans in Congress to pass the SAVE America Act--a bill that would constitute the most significant restriction on the right to vote in generations--because Republicans cannot win this November without it, and they have said the quiet part out loud. In fact, President Trump has shouted the quiet part out loud. We don't have to read between the lines. He has made it absolutely clear that voter suppression is the end, the strategy, and the goal.

Over 20 million Americans--1 in 10 voting-age Americans--simply don't

have access to the documentation that this bill would require to vote. Voting identification in some form ought to be required, no question. This is not a voter identification bill; it is a voter purge bill. It would take that private information from voter rolls and in effect eliminate those names from the rolls based on other information available to the administration.

If President Trump were really serious about stopping voter fraud, especially cyber interference and possible foreign influence, he would not have dismantled the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency, he would not have decimated the Agency that is responsible for stopping voter fraud, he would not have dismantled the counterterrorism units of the FBI and the Department of Justice. He would make them more robust, devote more resources to them, because that is the way to stop voter fraud, is to have investigators and experts go after it, pursue it, prosecute it. But the goal here is not to go after noncitizen voting because that problem is negligible. It is miniscule. The objective is to stop legitimate voters from going to the polls.

Mr. President, 250 years ago, America broke from the chains of monarchy. They chose democracy, a government that is supposed to be by and for the people. But as we approach this Nation's birthday, we are challenged as never before to defend democracy by advocating the right of every American to vote in free and fair elections and defending that right--not enough to talk about it but to defend it.

Thankfully, we still do have our democracy. It is under threat as never before. We are seeing the tentacles of totalitarianism begin to strangle the free press through the FCC's vicious attacks, through the effort to stifle legitimate dissent within our government and among our people. But we know there are people willing to stand up and speak out. We have seen it in the indivisible rallies across the country. We have seen it in voter registration. We have seen it in the anger that we are all hearing and the angst and anxiety about the future of our great Nation in peril at the moment.

We will have it as long as we recognize that democracy is not a spectator sport. It is not something that is guaranteed unless we defend it. We will have it only so long as we keep it, as Benjamin Franklin warned. And we will have a republic, as he told the person who asked him after the Constitutional Convention, only as long as we can keep it. It is up to us. Our time is now.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, my colleagues across the aisle are presenting what they call the SAVE Act and are saying it is about stopping noncitizens from voting, but that is not true. This bill is entirely about stopping citizens from voting, taking away the ballot box from millions and millions of Americans.

So let's call this bill what it really is: the ``Stop Citizens From Voting ACT'' or ``Stop Act.'' It is about rigging the next election, and we know so because Donald Trump said it himself. He said: You pass this act, and ``It will guarantee the midterms'' and ``every election for a long time.''

Why did he have such confidence that it would guarantee the November election for his party? The answer is because this bill is about stopping groups from voting who tend to vote for Democrats. This is, again, about rigging the next election.

There are repeated investigations by law enforcement, by news organizations, by universities that have found that you are more likely to get struck by lighting than for a noncitizen to vote. It is not just rare for a noncitizen to vote, it is super rare.

In Oregon, a review of vote-by-mail by the State over 19--actually 20 years, 2000 through 2019, found less than 1 in a million cases of voter fraud.

In Utah--my colleague who is presiding tonight is from Utah. Utah completed a citizenship review of its voter registration list of more than 2 million voters. They identified one noncitizen--one--and zero instances of noncitizen voting. One registered out of 2 million; zero voting.

Even Speaker Johnson admitted about noncitizen voting that ``it's not been something . . . provable.'' Well, actually, what he really should have said: It is not provable because it is rarer than rare.

That is why we know this bill is not about noncitizens voting; it is about stopping citizens from voting.

Let's just take a look at the impact, starting with the impact on married women.

The Republican plan: Stop married women from voting. A slightly softer version of that is, make it very difficult for them to vote, because this is what the bill does. It says that each State has to submit its voter registration database to the Trump administration. The Trump administration will go through and identify anyone it suspects might not be a citizen. And it has clarified that that means if your last name is different than the name on your birth certificate, you are suspect.

Well, where we are--69 million married women in America changed their names when they got married. That means 69 million American women get pinged by the Trump administration saying: We are not sure you can vote, and you are going to have to start from scratch and reregister.

Reregistering is very difficult. You have to have a passport or you have to have a combination of a birth certificate and another form of approved ID in combination--either a passport by itself or two forms of ID, one of which is your birth certificate, and that other piece has to be very specific, meeting the terms of the bill.

In Oregon, our estimate is that 700,000 married women would have to reregister to vote, including my wife. My wife's name is Mary Sorteberg. That was the name on her birth certificate, except on her birth certificate, her middle name is different because when we got married, she changed her middle name to honor her grandmother Rose. She would have a hard time voting. Millions of American women would have a hard time voting.

It is also about stopping Tribal citizens from voting. The ``Stop Act'' makes it impossible to use your Tribal ID to register to vote, and it makes it impossible to use your Tribal ID by itself to actually vote. You can't use it for registration, and you can't use it by itself to actually vote.

Tribal citizens are less likely to have a passport in the first place, and we know that many do not have a birth certificate. All across America, there are people who have been born at home who do not have birth certificates--more common in some Tribal communities.

Tribal communities are remote. Often, they have to travel a long way to get to a place where you can register to vote because you have to register to vote in person.

So all of these things are designed to make it harder for Tribal members to vote, and that is wrong.

This bill is also about the less affluent being able to vote. It makes it hard for them. Stop the less affluent from voting or at least make it much more difficult for them.

You know that a passport takes 6 months to get and costs about $165. That is a big toll. A couple, if they were trying to get that passport so they could vote, might not get it in time for the election, and they would have to pay $330. Wow. That is a poll tax on the less affluent to be able to vote.

If they can locate the county registrar and their specific county in America and if they were born in a hospital and if there was a birth certificate, they might also be able to acquire their birth certificate. That also costs money.

We know that the less affluent are much less likely to have a passport in the first place, and therefore it is much more expensive for them to undertake the qualifications of this bill. In fact, only one in five Americans who earn less than $50,000 has a passport. And we know that poorer States are less likely to have passports, including many States in the South--Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, and Louisiana.

So we are facing an attack on each of these groups, but those are not the only groups. Let's talk about students.

The ``Stop Act'' is designed to make it hard for students to vote. First of all, it says you can't have a voter drive. Why? Because you can't register people at their dorm room with ordinary documents the way it has always been done everywhere. No. They have

to go in person to an election center, and who knows where that election center is.

And they are going to have to miss class or go to do it, and they are like, well, why can't I upload these documents online to be examined? Well, because they are trying to make it hard for you to vote. Why? Because students tend to vote on the blue side of the aisle.

And if you need your birth certificate to register, now, if you are going to school in a different State from where you are registered to vote or where you would register to vote, you would have to travel home.

Well, many students don't travel home during holidays because it is expensive, and students often don't have money.

Oh, they are rich; they are fine. I am sure they will take a private jet to go get their voter registration.

But ordinary students, they are struggling to pay that tuition. That is a big imposition to say you have to travel to another State in order to be able to register to vote.

So here we are with yet another attack beyond these groups, and that is an attack on vote-by-mail. Under the amendment that has been filed by the Republicans this evening, it bans vote-by-mail.

Now, let's think about how hard it is to hold an election in a State like Oregon or a State like Utah that votes by mail. Oregon hasn't had a vote at a polling booth in 28 years.

So here we are. This law goes into effect immediately. Our primary election in Oregon is on May 20. How are you supposed to get all those polling places in place, all that whole new system, in just a few weeks' time? Extremely difficult.

And then you submit your voter database to Team Trump. They purge it with a very big bias to make it hard for demographic groups that associate more with Democrats to vote. They ping them and say: You are no longer registered. You have to reregister.

And maybe they get that ping. I don't know. The election in Oregon is on May 19. Maybe they get that notice on May 10. You have 9 days to get a passport. It is not going to happen.

You have got 9 days to reach out to your county somewhere around the country, where you were born, and get a birth certificate. It is not going to happen.

Millions of people are instantly disenfranchised in an impossible-to- set-up system in a few weeks' time.

Those groups that I talked about--students, Tribal members, the less affluent, women--this bill is targeted at them with extraordinary precision because this bill is about rigging the November election.

And that is exactly what Trump said: You give me this bill; my party will win November and every other election for a long time to come.

So, colleagues, this is wrong. Every one of my fellow Senators on both sides of the aisle knows what this is. This is an attack on a partisan basis to rig the November election. Every person here who took an oath to the Constitution to defend the right to vote knows that this is about rigging the election by stopping people from voting. It is really a violation of your oath of office.

So let's not let this happen--this egregious assault by an authoritarian President. We have already seen this authoritarian President take away powers from this body--the House and the Senate, Congress--that belong under the Constitution to Congress.

Our Founders said the power of taxation, including tariffs, belongs to Congress. This President took it anyway and said: I don't care that I am violating the Constitution. Challenge me in court.

It took a year for the courts to act.

He proceeded to say: I am going to cancel programs that are both funded and authorized by Congress--which is a violation of law and the Constitution.

It is the power of the purse, and he said: I don't care. Challenge me in court.

He proceeded to launch a war without authorization, even though the Constitution requires this body to authorize a war.

So here we are, three major powers--power of the purse, power of taxation, power of war--all stolen by the President and not confronted by the House or Senate leadership.

And now we have House and Senate leadership conspiring with the President to strip the vote from millions of Americans, an extraordinarily unconstitutional act. But this time, it is not the President acting alone. He is acting with the support, the cooperation, the partnership of the majority party.

There is probably nothing more sacred in a democratic republic than the ballot box. It is the beating heart of what it means to be a democratic republic. This bill takes a knife and stabs it through that beating heart.

Let's not let this happen.