Your Papers, Please
SAVEing America, one layer of control at a time
One March 17, the U.S. Senate began deliberations on the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or SAVE Act as it commonly called, which was first introduced in the House last year. As to how that will go, a quick check of the Magic 8 Ball reveals…
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer has voiced his opposition to the bill, calling it “a dagger to the heart of our democracy.” Senate Republican Leader John Thune is under pressure from the powerful MAGA wing of his party to force a vote, but he resists, arguing that “the votes aren’t there…to nuke the filibuster.” Meanwhile, the MAGA King President only muddies the waters further, stirring up shit in his usual way.
That Senator Thune insists on respecting the fillibuster rules perhaps reflects his concern that Republicans could lose control of the Senate in the midterms, and it would be best to have that safeguard in place to use against a potential thin Democratic majority in the future. I also think he wants to uphold what relevance the Senate still has in this era of the “unitary executive,” to let MAGA know Trump isn’t 100% in charge.
I have written on this Substack before that the trappings of Republican government have been demolished and a modern version of Caesarism established.
The Senate might be the last dangling bit of the old Constitution still in place, propping up some semblance of a Republic, if we can keep it.
Of course, the sort of obstructionism that the Senators are practicing is exactly what has led to widespread disillusionment among U.S. voters about the utility of democracy. It’s how the GOP was able to erode trust in government to the point that they could institute one-man rule.
For many eligible voters, the impression that a democratic government is unable to function might mean they don’t really care about sticking a dagger in its heart. Maybe a mercy killing is what’s best for it.
So What Are We SAVEing, Exactly?
No one’s saying anything as cynical as that, of course.
Supporters of the SAVE act - and they abound on my social media feeds - argue that proving citizenship to register and showing ID to vote only makes sense. You need ID for so many other things in life, so it should be the same for exercising your right to vote. I see memes supporting the assertion that there is broad support for voter ID across the political spectrum. I will just post one screenshot from a reputable polling organization as evidence to back this up:
Notably, there is much more support among Republicans than among Democrats. Republicans are more law-and-order-y, I suppose. Alternately, Democrats are warier about voter ID requirements because they see it as potentially disenfranchising, as denying people a lawful right, given that the there is a cost to acquiring identification. It would disproportionately affect the poor and out of touch, undoubtedly. This would be the “poll tax” argument against the SAVE act.
Opponents of the SAVE act - and they are also all over my social media feeds - will point out that the devil is in the details. The SAVE act lays down the law, but it doesn’t make any provision for funding the effort required. States are on their own as far as figuring out how to comply. A mandate to submit voter rolls to DHS for the purpose of purging known noncitizens surrenders power to an already too powerful and constitutionally questionable Federal agency.
If we’re going to have a Federal Voter ID law, Democrats might say, then let’s do it right. Let’s establish a clear standard and ensure that there is money to back up getting everyone an ID. Let’s ensure that States retain control over their voter rolls. It’s not like there is any emergency here, as voter fraud is an insignificant problem.
But of course, framing voter fraud as a problem is exactly how MAGA is raising support for the law. Trump insists it is needed to “SAVE America.” He also insists that the 2020 election was stolen from him, and surely there are Trump supporters out there who believe this. They don’t trust our elections.
But Democrats don’t trust MAGA pushing for this law, which claims to uphold election integrity but feels more like voter suppression. Republicans have to fall back on voter suppression, after all, since their positions are unpopular.
As always in our political era, the lack of trust is a big problem.
Keeping Us in Line
One common criticism of the SAVE act I see is that will disporportionately affect women, since women are much more likely than men to have a last name that differs form the one on their birth certificate. It’s another step in the Project 2025 program to take us to world of The Handmaid’s Tale, in line with defunding childcare, restricting abortion access and more. Keep women at home, making babies.
It’s no wonder, then, that women might be suspicious of the intentions behind the SAVE act.
And it seems to me that conservatives and Republicans, supposedly against big, intrusive government, are championing adding more layers of bureaucracy to our lives. Don’t they know they are pushing us towards a state where we have to walk around with our papers in order, or risk arrest and imprisonment? You know, a police state?
They also might consider that stricter Voter ID laws might actually cost them more votes than they cost the opposition party. That’s because there has been a shift in the membership of the coalitions that make up the two parties, as I have already covered in an earlier post.
Basically, the Republican coalition of today’s MAGA era looks a lot like the coalition that elected recent Democatic Presidents, as this chart indicates:
Note: low education, low income. Those are precisely the folks that are least likely to have their paperwork in order already, or to have the means and motivation to go through all the hoops and pay all the fees needed to meet new ID requirements. High education, high income folks - that is, Democratic voters - probably already have their Real IDs and passports and so forth.
So the SAVE act might suppress the MAGA vote, is what I’m saying.
Believe it or not, I don’t really want that. I would like to preserve democracy.
Maybe having a national ID of some kind is a good idea, in the long run. It would help us with resolving our struggle over the identity of the nation itself. But unfortunately it’s going to be hard to get that done transparently and fairly, given the deep distrust that poisons our politics. That’s what we truly need to be saved from.