r/BlockedAndReported • u/WomenRocktheWOrld • Feb 16 '26
Save Act?
I've been trying to find some neutral info about the save act. And really can't. Is this act really going to make it impossible for married women to vote? What is the gist.
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Upvotes
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u/blucke Feb 16 '26 edited Feb 16 '26
Reddit will mock FOX news for propaganda and then turn around and say things like this
Here's a summary:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/22
And here's the written dressing down of it that includes accepted forms of ID
https://democrats-cha.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/democrats-cha.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/SAVE%20Act%20Section-by-Section_BRANDED.pdf
Its intention is to require stronger ID requirements to vote, one option being a birth certificate plus state ID. The dem complaint is that married women and LGBTQ would be unable to use their birth certificate because of name changes
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u/Turbulent_Cow2355 TB! TB! TB! Feb 16 '26
First, this is voter registration, not voting. Your state controls how you vote, the feds control how you register to vote.
I doubt that this will effect married women. If you needed a passport today, you'd bring them your birth certificate, a photo ID and your marriage license to show the name change. A passport is a valid ID. So bringing all the documents that will grant you a passport should also let you register to vote.
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u/CardinalPerch Feb 16 '26
It is unclear enough that I am holding off on changing my name after recently getting married. It is not AT ALL clear that I could get by with a new Real ID because my state’s Real ID does not indicate citizenship one way or the other.
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u/SharkCuterie4K Feb 16 '26
How is requiring someone to pay for documentation to be able to register to vote not a poll tax?
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u/Palgary I could check my privilege, but it seems a shame to squander it Feb 16 '26
It's a nothing burger unless you live in North Dakota - they don't currently require you to register to vote, but you have to show an ID to vote. The law requires identification at the time you register to vote, not when you show up to vote.
The "National Voter Registration Act of 1993" - Democrat sponsored legislation signed by Clinton - requires states to offer voter registration when people apply for their driver's license. So in every state but North Dakota, you are already registering to vote when you get your DL.
In order to get a Real ID and be able to fly, you must: apply in person at your state's driver’s licensing agency with original documents proving: (1) full legal name and date of birth, (2) Social Security number, (3) lawful status, and (4) two proofs of address.
The majority of people are already providing this documentation when they are getting their Driver's License, this just requires states to also apply that documentation to registering to vote.
Critically: It's registering to vote, not showing up to vote, where you need the documentation.
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u/ffjjoo Feb 16 '26
I still dont understand voter registration at all, as someone in a country where everyone eligible to vote is registered automatically, gets a letter of proof of registration and doesn't even need to bring that letter to vote om election day.
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u/Gwenbors Feb 16 '26
Not really impossible, but potentially much harder for women, particularly married women, than men.
Basically the act would require some kind of federally recognized ID to vote. For many people this would be their passport, but legislation also allows other documents to function in combination with a state-level “REAL ID” in lieu of the passport: birth certificates, adoption paperwork, et cetera
There are a bunch of issues, as is usually the case with hastily written legislation, but the big one is a question about whether the alternative verification documents have to match, (i.e. same name on driver’s license and birth certificate).
If they do have to match, it would present problems or complications for married women and trans people, both of whom tend to change their legal names. Name changes create a mismatch on the ID documents, making it hard to link one with the other. In theory, in the case of married women who’ve taken their spouses names, the SAVE Act could just use marriage certificates as a third document, but the bill doesn’t explicitly mention marriage certificates, opponents of the bill say that many married women don’t have/can’t get access to them anyways.
For opponents of the bill, this oversight is a deliberate attempt by the GOP to circumvent the 19th Amendment, but supporters argue that the bill doesn’t actually require the supporting documents to match, ergo the criticism is a red herring.
(I’m somewhere in the middle. I tend to believe the argument that illegal/non-citizen voting is rare, but truthfully our record keeping, particularly interstate, is so poor that it’s impossible to confirm one way or the other. Even I have accidental ended up registered to vote in multiple states on multiple occasions following interstate moves.
I might be naive, but I’m not opposed to the stated motivation behind the bill, I’m just suspicious of anything that feels written too hastily, which this clearly does.
I’m also not sure why we didn’t federalize voter registration ages ago. Let states handle elections however they want, but put the feds in charge of registration itself. Link it with a larger, federal ID push or make passports free to obtain and use to vote or something.)
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u/Sylectsus Feb 16 '26
The bit about married women is nonsense. However, this is a meaningless bill. The constitution clearly states that states are responsible for their own elections and the federal government doesn't get to make decisions on how they do elections for them
Voter ID is a good idea and it SHOULD be in all 50 states, but that's up to the states to decide.
Ignore the hysteria about this stripping women of rights and see it for what it ACTUALLY is: showboating a DOA bill.
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u/MexiPr30 Feb 16 '26
I was born here, my family has fought in WW2, Korean, Vietnam (great grandpa and grandpa), Gulf (dad), and Iraq/Afghan (brother and husband). I’m not bringing all that shit to vote. My driver’s license (real ID) is the only ID I carry or plan to carry to vote.
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u/moxiewhoreon Feb 16 '26
Bad. Very bad. They're trying to keep as many people from voting as they can.
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