Federal Push for Voter Registrations Receives New Scrutiny Ahead of 2024 Election

 The same bill will be introduced to the Democrat-controlled Senate by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who encouraged that it be taken up and passed in a statement to The Epoch Times.

“Thousands of illegal immigrants are being given voter registration forms and driver’s licenses, allowing them to cast illegitimate ballots on election day,” Mr. Lee said. “At a time when trust in voting is more important than ever, we must stop foreign election interference and pass the SAVE Act.

“Voting is both a sacred right and responsibility of American citizenship, and allowing the people of other nations access to our elections is a grave blow to our security and self-governance. I’m proud to stand with Chip Roy to save our democratic process and representative government.”

Speaking with President Trump at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Johnson explained why the conference is pursuing this legislation now.

During his remarks, he noted that as many as 16 million new illegal immigrants could have entered the country under President Joe Biden’s term in office. Estimates of the exact number vary widely.

“Among the problems that flows from this open border catastrophe is directly related to this threat to election integrity,” Mr. Johnson said.

Current Law

Mr. Johnson tied his concerns primarily to the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA), otherwise dubbed the “Motor Voter” law, which allows people to register to vote at the same time that they pick up a driver’s license from their state’s Department of Motor Vehicles or other state agencies.

However, the law does not allow states to seek documentary proof of citizenship, instead requiring that they take an individual’s word that they are a citizen unless the individual’s eligibility is called into question.

A 2013 Supreme Court decision in Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona expanded on the law, finding that the federal law supersedes existing state laws requiring documentary proof to vote—effectively banning states from imposing such requirements for federal voter registration.

Speaking about this law, Mr. Johnson said, “we think that’s a serious problem”—one that he said Republicans will seek to amend.

As so many illegal immigrants are already in the country, current law raises red flags that could potentially affect the outcome of the election, Mr. Johnson said.

“There’s so many millions of illegals in the country, that if only one out of one hundred voted, they would cast potentially hundreds of thousands of votes,” Mr. Johnson said. “That could turn an election.”

Critics of the bill have retorted that federal law already prohibits illegal immigrants from voting.

However, due to the Supreme Court’s expansion of the NVRA in 2013, existing laws include no solid mechanism for states to ensure that their voters are citizens.

It’s unclear when the bill will be taken up in the lower chamber. But with Mr. Johnson’s blessing, it’s all but certain to come to the floor—forcing Democrats onto the record on the issue as immigration becomes a top concern for voters.

With Republicans’ slim majority, the bill has good odds of passing the lower chamber; it faces longer odds in the Democrat-controlled Senate, where Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) decides what comes to the floor.

Mr. Roy and Mr. Johnson will hold a press conference on the legislation at the Capitol on May 8.