Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) doubled down on his party’s opposition to President Donald Trump, vowing on Sunday that Democrats in the U.S. Senate would never “help” Republicans to pass the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act.
Despite the fact that the bill’s main focus — requiring valid proof of citizenship for voter registration — is popular among voters regardless of party, Schumer shared a post on X referring to the SAVE Act as “Jim Crow 2.0” and claiming that millions of people would be “disenfranchised” if it were to pass.
“The SAVE Act is Jim Crow 2.0. It would disenfranchise tens of millions of people,” Schumer complained. “If Trump is saying he won’t sign any bills until the SAVE Act is passed, then so be it: there will be total gridlock in the Senate. Senate Democrats will not help pass the SAVE Act under any circumstances.”
Schumer’s statement came just hours after Trump announced early Sunday that he intended to prioritize the SAVE Act — nicknamed by Republicans the SAVE America Act — and would not sign anything else until he saw it on his desk.
Praising calls for Senate Republicans to use the traditional — “talking” — filibuster to force a vote on the measure, Trump said that it had to be the top priority to “pass THE SAVE AMERICA ACT, an 88% issue with ALL VOTERS.”
“It must be done immediately. It supersedes everything else. MUST GO TO THE FRONT OF THE LINE,” he added. “I, as President, will not sign other Bills until this is passed.”
In addition to requiring proof of citizenship — either through a valid passport or a birth certificate — the SAVE Act would dramatically limit online and mail-in voter registration and would reduce mail-in balloting to military service-members or those limited by illness, disability, or travel. States would also be required to routinely examine voter rolls in order to ensure that non-citizens were not being registered to vote. Criminal penalties would apply to any officials who registered voters with improper identification.
Despite the fact that a majority of Americans support voter ID requirements generally (81%) and the SAVE America Act specifically (71%), according to a Harvard Harris poll taken just after Trump’s State of the Union address, elected Democrats like Schumer have continued to insist that requiring proof of citizenship would necessarily disenfranchise voters who cannot access the proper documents.
The SAVE Act passed the House in February.