Access a recording of today’s press conference HERE
WASHINGTON — Today, civil rights leaders and impacted voters came together to highlight the devastating impact the SAVE Act would have on our communities and our power to make the decisions that shape our futures. As the U.S. House of Representatives prepares to put the SAVE Act (H.R. 22) up for a vote this week, our elected officials must put voters first and reject this dangerous attack on the freedom to vote of all.
The speakers highlighted the harmful consequences of the SAVE Act and other attempted power grabs to suppress our vote, and discussed urgent actions needed to protect everyone’s freedom to vote. The SAVE Act would create significant barriers to voting, preventing us from holding our elected officials accountable and addressing issues that matter most to our communities — like health care, jobs, and economic security. From the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to the Freedom to Vote Act, we support real solutions to ensure our democracy works for all.
Leslie Proll, senior director for voting rights for The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, said: “The SAVE Act is a direct attack on our freedom to vote and a dangerous attempt to silence the voices of millions — particularly voters of color, low-income families, women, and young people — by erecting barriers to the ballot box. Let’s be clear: this is not about safeguarding elections. It is about stripping power from the people and undermining our democracy. But our communities are not backing down. We are standing united — organizing, resisting, and rising to protect the hard-won rights generations have fought to secure. This is a fight for the foundation of our freedoms. And just like those who came before us, we will not stop until We have a multiracial democracy for all where every voice is heard.”
Brian Lemek, Defend The Vote Action Fund Executive Director, said: “Blocking millions of American citizens from voting would deny them their ability to have a say in the decisions that impact their lives – from the cost of groceries to access to health care to stopping gun violence. It gives more influence to big donors and billionaires who shape policies for their own benefit at the expense of everyone else. Congress should reject the SAVE Act.”
Christine Wood, Co-Director, Declaration for American Democracy Coalition, said: “Our democracy works best when all of us, regardless of color, party, income, or zip code, have an equal say in the decisions that shape our future. But right now, a faction of extremist politicians are lying about our elections to justify and pass a radical political agenda to restrict voting for millions of eligible Americans. Instead of proceeding with this dangerous voter suppression bill, Congress should take actions that will strengthen our elections and ensure that all eligible voters have access to the ballot box.”
Deborah Dicks Maxwell, President of North Carolina NAACP, said: “Let’s call this bill what it is: the federal version of voter suppression. A solution to a problem that doesn’t exist, but that creates very real consequences for the most vulnerable among us. And we’ve seen this before. We’ve seen laws that look neutral on paper but are devastating in practice. We’ve seen poll taxes and literacy tests. We’ve seen precinct closures and voter purges. The tactics change, but the goal stays the same: to shrink the electorate and silence those who most need to be heard. But the NAACP has never been in the business of silence. We are in the business of justice.”
Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the voting rights program, Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law, said: “Congress must reject this bill, which would block millions of American citizens from voting. Let this not be the Congress that distinguishes itself as the first to engage in voter suppression. Congress should be expanding the freedom to vote, not curtailing it.”
Virginia Kase Solomón, President and CEO of Common Cause, said: “This bill would make it harder for everyday Americans to register and vote at a time when billionaires who helped elect President Trump are now getting another tax cut on the backs of working families. Rural voters, married women, and every American will have a harder time casting a ballot, but that is the goal of the SAVE Act. If it becomes law, fewer Americans will have a say on how their money is spent – about funding for their local hospitals, fire departments or their children’s schools.”
Beth Lynk, Executive Director of When We All Vote, said: “Under the SAVE Act, When We All Vote, our partners, and our thousands of volunteers would no longer be able to help register voters online or in person at local libraries, concerts, community parades, places of worship, sporting events, and more — core work that can be the difference between someone casting their ballot or sitting out an election. We should be working to make voting easier, not harder. The SAVE Act’s restrictions on voter registration drives and online voter registration are not a coincidence — they are voter suppression. The SAVE Act is a clear attempt to put politics over people. This bill could threaten more than 20 million eligible voters — especially young voters, Black and Brown voters, women, lower-income voters, and rural voters — and it would eliminate long-standing, nonpartisan voter registration efforts that have been a pillar of our democracy for decades.”
John C. Yang, President and Executive Director at Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC, said: “We urge members of Congress to oppose the SAVE Act, which would disenfranchise millions of Americans who are eligible to vote by stoking fear against immigrant communities. Instead of preventing the false problem of noncitizen voting, the Act’s requirement for documentary proof of citizenship upon voter registration would block millions of people, including naturalized citizens, who lack access to the respective documents or have mismatched documents due to name changes from being able to vote. This risk is amplified for the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander community, of which nearly 50% are naturalized citizens. Our representatives must instead look to advance our democracy through policies that protect and expand voting access and embrace the diversity of our nation.”
Min. Christian S. Watkins, Democracy Reform Government Relations Advocate at NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, said: “This Executive Order seeks to take our country back to the Jim Crow era, when the rights of so many citizens—Black and Latino men, all women, and people with little economic power—faced many challenges, from poll taxes to literacy tests, all intended to deny them the right to vote. Power was in the hands of wealthy white men who made political decisions that severely marginalized those who could not participate. All these groups sacrificed their time, talent, and sometimes their lives for the right to vote. Passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965 was the legislative capstone of this effort. Now, almost 60 years later and with the stroke of a pen, this Administration, with no evidence of voter fraud, used a false claim against immigrants to attempt to gut our election systems and disenfranchise millions of citizens. This is an attempt to reestablish the power of the white, wealthy few over the common good. The freedom to vote is a foundational American right. States have strong checks and balances in place to ensure their elections are secure and accurate. This bill and those like it are meant to divide us at a time when we are united in what we want from our government leaders: solutions to fix our broken economy and the protection of our democracy.”
More than 35 civil rights and democracy organizations shared their strong opposition to the SAVE Act. You can read their statements here.
[Crossposted from The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights]
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights is a coalition charged by its diverse membership of more than 240 national organizations to promote and protect the rights of all persons in the United States. The Leadership Conference works toward an America as good as its ideals. For more information on The Leadership Conference and its member organizations, visit www.civilrights.org.
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