There is no evidence of widespread voting by noncitizens. The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act initiated by Sen. Mike Lee is a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.
What it will do is prevent many women from voting.
When my 80-year-old mother moved to Utah, she needed to get a new ID and register to vote. She had to show a birth certificate, her marriage license to my father, her divorce papers from my father (in which she kept his last name to match that of her children) and then her marriage license to her second husband.
This was the only way to trace the name on her birth certificate to her current last name.
This took two trips to the DMV, which was not an easy task for someone of her age who uses a walker, and she was fortunate to have my help in tracking down the relevant documents.
Now imagine trying to do this for a person who may have moved frequently over the course of their lives and has lost documents along the way. They will need to contact various offices, possibly across many states and request the appropriate documentation which may also require fees that they may not be able to afford. And imagine someone working two jobs while trying to raise a family needing to do this.
The barriers will be too high for many of these people and they will lose their ability to vote. The SAVE Act does not “save” voting rights.
Brandi Williams, Holladay