A voter casts his ballot at a polling station in Rye, New York, on Tuesday, June 25, 2024. (Bing Guan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
The nonprofit noted that the federal voter registration form created by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) does not require applicants to demonstrate documentary proof of citizenship. The form merely requires voter registrants to sign a pledge "under penalty of perjury," swearing or affirming that "I am a United States citizen."
The U.S. Supreme Court, as America First Legal explained, previously held that because the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) of 1993 requires that states must "accept and use" the EAC form, then "the NVRA forbids States to demand that an applicant submit additional information beyond that required by the Federal Form."
DHS’s U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) does make available to states a system for verifying the immigration status of foreign nationals known as the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) Program. But America First Legal stressed that "SAVE has a design flaw and does not fully solve the critical problem of foreign nationals voting in federal elections."
Most notably, SAVE requires users to submit an Alien Registration Number or some other DHS identifier to run queries through the system – something that states and localities do not have when registering someone to vote. Furthermore, SAVE does not process Social Security or driver’s license numbers, which are the ID numbers that state and local officials are most likely to have at their disposal.
"Thus, in practice, SAVE is practically useless for verifying the citizenship of voter registrants," the letter says. "It can only be of value when a State has the specific numeric identifiers that are the searchable variables in SAVE. Most States would not have access to these identifiers, in part because none of these identifiers are required under the current version of the EAC federal voter registration form. States cannot use the most readily available identifiers they have in their possession, including social security and driver’s license numbers."
The letter proposed a solution: "States should submit requests to DHS to verify the citizenship or immigration status of registered voters on voter rolls – and DHS has a legal obligation to provide such information."
A man makes his way to vote in Santa Ana, California, on "Super Tuesday," March 5, 2024. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images)
America First Legal president Stephen Miller said the letters come in "response to this extraordinary threat to our elections," providing the election officials in all 50 states with an "emergency action plan" that explains "the steps they can immediately pursue to defend democracy by purging their voting rolls of illegal aliens and non-citizens."
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"States have the utmost authority, obligation, and expectation from the American people to prevent noncitizens from voting in elections," Hamilton added in a statement. "Congress has equipped States with the tools necessary to verify the citizenship status of registered voters and remove ineligible foreign nationals – but States must act swiftly to ensure that only citizens vote in this fall’s elections. Failing to use these available tools is an abdication of the responsibility to ensure our elections are decided solely by, and for, the American people."
Danielle Wallace is a reporter for Fox News Digital covering politics, crime, police and more. Story tips can be sent to danielle.wallace@fox.com and on Twitter: @danimwallace.
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