WASHINGTON, DC — The U.S. Senate resumed debate on the SAVE America Act following a two-week recess, as Republicans press to advance the legislation ahead of the November midterm elections. The bill passed the Republican-controlled House of Representatives in February 2026 along party lines and faces a steeper path in the Senate, where Republicans hold 53 seats, short of the 60 votes likely needed for passage.

The House-passed version requires voters to provide documentary proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, when registering to vote. It also implements stricter voter identification requirements for individuals casting ballots by mail or in person, and would require states to run their voter rolls through the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Alien Verification Eligibility system to identify potential noncitizens already enrolled. The 2026 version carries over criminal liability provisions for election officials who register voters without the required documentation, and requires states to regularly turn their voter rolls over to the Department of Homeland Security.

The legislation does not provide funding for the new verification processes, which would take effect immediately upon enactment. Under the U.S. Constitution, states administer elections and have different processes for registering voters and confirming citizenship. Voting by noncitizens is illegal in the U.S., and all people registering to vote attest that they are U.S. citizens under threat of perjury.

President Donald Trump has made passage of the bill a top priority ahead of the midterm elections. In March 2026, he vowed not to sign any other bills into law until the SAVE America Act was passed, and said he would not endorse any Republicans who did not support it. Trump has called the measure "one of the most IMPORTANT & CONSEQUENTIAL pieces of legislation in the history of Congress, and America itself."

Trump has maintained that U.S. elections are marred by widespread fraud, including noncitizen voting, despite there being no evidence supporting these claims. The Heritage Foundation found only exceedingly rare instances of voter fraud over decades of U.S. elections. Supporters of the SAVE America Act say it will boost election security, and detractors say it risks disenfranchising millions of voters.

Kansas enacted a law in 2013 requiring voters to prove their citizenship when registering. Evidence in federal court filings showed that 18,000 people, about 8% of those registering, were blocked from registering under the law, and only about a quarter of those initially blocked eventually registered to vote. Blocked registrants were disproportionately young people with no party affiliation. Elections officials attributed the high number of blocked registrants to mismatches between married names and birth certificates and difficulties obtaining birth certificates. A federal court struck down the Kansas law in 2018. Arizona enacted a similar requirement in 2005, and in 2024 the U.S. Supreme Court blocked the use of documentary proof of citizenship to register for federal elections in the Arizona case.