On Wednesday, the House GOP leadership will move a Continuing Resolution that extends government funding for six months beyond the end of the current fiscal year. The SAVE Act, a bill to require states to obtain documentary proof of citizenship before registering someone to vote – which passed the House in July, but has been left alone by the Senate – will be attached to it.
The House should vote to pass the combined bill and send it to the Senate, and the Senate should pass it and send it to the president’s desk.
When the House broke for its August recess, Speaker Mike Johnson faced two key decisions on the annual government funding exercise. One, for how long should the Continuing Resolution extend government funding at its current levels. And two, should the vehicle be a so-called “clean” C.R. with no additional legislative items attached to it, or – since it was likely to be the last “must-pass” bill considered before Congress went home to campaign at the end of September – should some other legislative priority be tacked on?
As he was pondering what strategy would be best, the House Freedom Caucus, composed of many of the Republican Conference’s most conservative members, released a statement “urging Republican leadership to use our leverage in the September spending fight to prevent non-citizens from voting in our elections and ensure Democrats cannot undermine President Trump’s second term with a ‘lame duck’ omnibus in December.” The statement continued: “[I]n the inevitability that Congress considers a Continuing Resolution, government funding should be extended into early 2025 to avoid a lame duck omnibus that preserves Democrat spending and policies well into the next administration.”
The HFC statement concluded: “Furthermore, the Continuing Resolution should include the SAVE Act – as called for by President Trump – to prevent non-citizens from voting ...”
Upon consideration, Johnson decided to take the HFC’s advice. Consequently, the House will vote tomorrow on a Continuing Resolution that extends government funding until March 31, 2025, and includes the SAVE Act.
The extension of funding well into the next year does two things. First, it avoids the biennial lame duck scrum, in which a Congress with many representatives on their way out the door (and, therefore, no longer accountable to their constituents, because they will never again stand for election to the office they hold) nevertheless casts votes on matters deemed so touchy by leadership that their consideration was deliberately left until after the election, precisely so the threat of being held accountable by constituents at the ballot box can be eliminated entirely.
Representatives already eyeing the exit doors are believed to be less likely to be swayed by constituent considerations, and more likely to be susceptible to the Swamp’s blandishments. So pushing consideration of the next spending bill into the next Congress, where those who cast votes will once again be doing so in the full knowledge that they can be held accountable for those votes by their constituents at the next regularly scheduled election, is desirable.
Second, by pushing the next spending fight into the next Congress, it also pushes the next spending fight into a new presidential term, where a president not named Biden will wield the veto pen. House conservatives believe it would be political folly to come to agreement on a spending bill with Democrats now when, if they could wait just a few months, they have the possibility of coming to agreement on a spending bill with Donald Trump back in the White House, when, they believe, fewer Democrat and more Republican spending priorities would shape the final product.
The addition of the SAVE Act to the bill is a hardball play. Despite deceptive media reports, it does not attempt to make noncitizen voting illegal. What the bill does is require states to obtain documentary proof of citizenship before registering a new voter, which currently is not in federal law – that is, the SAVE Act adds an enforcement method to help ensure that the law is implemented properly.
The bill passed the House with bipartisan support in July, but Schumer has no interest in bringing it to the floor. He prefers the current regime, in which state officials need nothing more than a signature attesting to a prospective voter’s citizenship, and in which state officials are prohibited from asking for proof of citizenship. The current system, in other words, has a loophole so big you could drive a truck through it. But Schumer and his Democrat allies have no interest in closing it.
The contrast between the two parties is stark. Current law forbids voting in federal elections by anyone who is not a citizen. Republicans are pushing to add a commonsense enforcement method, in the belief that if we have laws, we should enforce them.
Democrats are saying no, thank you – because, actually, they don’t mind much if illegal immigrants vote.
That’s emblematic of the larger stakes at risk in the upcoming election: On the one hand, we have Kamala Harris and the Democrats, who have zero interest in enforcing our nation’s laws, starting with our immigration laws. On the other hand, we have Donald Trump and the Republicans, who are putting America first.
Come to think of it, this isn’t really a Capitol Hill fight at all. It’s a call to action for America’s voters.
Jenny Beth Martin is Honorary Chairman of Tea Party Patriots Action.