Analysts say Republicans are "a few votes shy" from successfully bypassing the filibuster, but Senator Cornyn's flip combined with anti-transgender demands make this fight worth paying attention to.
The key takeaway: These voter-ID measures are poorly thought out, even for the people whose explicit goal is to disenfranchise Democratic voters.
Married women who change their name are more likely to lean Republican.
Voters who have all their documentation up-to-date are more likely to lean Democrat.
This was not always the case, but based on last election's demographics, there is a good chance that this Voter ID bill would harm the GOP more than it would help them.
Regardless, it deserves our opposition, because even if it weren't littered with these awful anti-trans provisions, it is still fundamentally an attack on democracy.
I would be concerned that they simply won't enforce these GOP-damaging provisions in states where they can get away with it. These people are not bound by law if it gets in the way of hate.
You're not wrong. Their whole party is in a contest between incompetence and malice. Which force will prevail in the end? Who knows, but we'll surely all suffer for it.
The fascists in Congress are doing everything they can to lock in lifetime control of the country currently known as the United States and disenfranchise anyone not white male, cis-het, evangelical, and rabidly conservative. And Trump's bought and paid for SCOTUS will more than likely uphold this demolition of democracy.
First they came for the trans, then they came for the women, next they came for the immigrants and anyone brown, black, or speaking another language. SMH
I have contacted my two Senators and the Senate Minority Leader by phone and will be following up with the following:
The so-called SAVE Act is not an election security measure — it is a calculated assault on the fundamental right to vote. Under the false banner of “integrity,” this legislation erects deliberate barriers designed to silence millions of lawful voters, particularly seniors, students, married women who have changed their names, naturalized citizens, low-income Americans, and anyone lacking easy access to specific bureaucratic documents.
By demanding rigid proof-of-citizenship requirements that many eligible voters simply do not possess or cannot readily obtain, the SAVE Act transforms voting from a constitutional right into a paperwork obstacle course.
It invites mass disenfranchisement not through outright bans, but through administrative exclusion — the most insidious form of voter suppression because it hides behind technicalities while stripping real people of political power.
The bill forces election officials into impossible verification burdens, threatens voter registration systems that have functioned securely for decades, and risks purging legitimate voters from the rolls based on flawed data matching and bureaucratic error.
It undermines long-standing bipartisan systems like mail registration and voter assistance programs, replacing access with suspicion and participation with intimidation.
There is no credible evidence of widespread non-citizen voting that justifies these extreme measures.
The SAVE Act solves no real problem while creating a very real crisis: millions of eligible Americans placed at risk of losing their voice in their own democracy.
IF THS PASSES WE WILL NO LONGER HAVE FAIR AND FREE ELECTIONS
This is not election protection — it is election restriction. It weaponizes fear to justify exclusion and rewrites the rules of democracy so that participation becomes conditional rather than guaranteed.
A democracy that fears its voters is already in danger.
The SAVE Act moves the United States closer to that danger by making voting harder, narrower, and less representative of the people it is meant to serve. It must be recognized for what it is: a sweeping attempt to reshape the electorate by erecting barriers where the Constitution promises access.
"There is no credible evidence of widespread non-citizen voting"
Hell there's no evidence of even "spread," never mind "wide." Studies repeatedly and I would easily venture invariably show such non-citizen voting at tiny fractions of one percent.
In fact, just today (3/12) came news that in January, the DOJ dropped an investigation into claims of non-citizen voting in Nevada in 2020 after finding just 38 *possible* - not confirmed, just maybe - non-citizen voters. That's 0.003% of the vote.
The SAVE America Act will be the final nail in the coffin for democracy in America and will usher in an endless string of incompetent fascist administrations. And OF FUCKING COURSE they're using trans people as the vehicle in which to ram this highly unpopular and EXTREMELY dangerous bill through Congress. Because fascism cannot exist without a scapegoat to demonize, now can it?
To clarify: this is talking about gender affirming surgeries on kids and not gender affirming care for kids, right? Will puberty blockers and HRT still be available?
Yes they're talking about surgeries which are ALREADY not allowed by the WPATH. So yet again they are attempting to solve a problem that does not exist, or only exists in statistically insignificant numbers.
But you know how it is with fascists. Give them an inch and they'll take a mile so you know puberty blockers and HRT will be next on the Federal ban list.
"Yes they're talking about surgeries which are ALREADY not allowed by the WPATH"
We are not afforded the luxury of inaccuracy being ascribed to inadvertence. WPATH forbids no surgery at any particular age, but suggests endorsement for it per meeting criteria. It is difficult to see how any minor could qualify for surgery by those criteria until they were after the beginning of puberty and then had been on blockers for a year and HRT for another -- and as a practical matter "top surgery" is delayed until 15~16yo, and the only circumstance where genital surgery is endorsed for a minor is the summer of their 17th year so they can recover from surgery before leaving home for college. That latter circumstance is met only very rarely per year in the US, for example Jazz Jennings having surgery her 17th year.
We aren't allowed to get anything wrong, please be accurate and nuanced about the actual criteria for surgery. WPATH does not forbid surgery before age 18, it is just only very rarely endorsed per their protocols.
While there would be much short term pain for our side, the GOP ending the filibuster would be ending their party in the long run. When Dems take control we would pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and other laws that would end GOP gerrymandering. That said I am against ending the filibuster now due to rollback of rights that would follow
. . . hanging over their head, is why I feel good about the Senate going 55/45 D to R, and a good quarter of the remaining Rs being nervous enough to go along with a purge of the executive and judiciary, ejecting Trump!'s MAGA altogether.
Remember per this, the Rs are 0 to 28 for flipping seats in recent special elections.
The GOPers quoted there are acting like they only need to motivate voters to show up who would never vote D. The proportion of I voters now going for D and the once fulminate MAGA voters who now feel betrayed are ignored there.
Good.
Let them be blindsided by the onrushing pyroclastic flow.
Interesting analysis from The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/2026/02/save-america-act-turnout/686145/
The key takeaway: These voter-ID measures are poorly thought out, even for the people whose explicit goal is to disenfranchise Democratic voters.
Married women who change their name are more likely to lean Republican.
Voters who have all their documentation up-to-date are more likely to lean Democrat.
This was not always the case, but based on last election's demographics, there is a good chance that this Voter ID bill would harm the GOP more than it would help them.
Regardless, it deserves our opposition, because even if it weren't littered with these awful anti-trans provisions, it is still fundamentally an attack on democracy.
I would be concerned that they simply won't enforce these GOP-damaging provisions in states where they can get away with it. These people are not bound by law if it gets in the way of hate.
You're not wrong. Their whole party is in a contest between incompetence and malice. Which force will prevail in the end? Who knows, but we'll surely all suffer for it.
The only way the GOP can get its way is by cheating and using violence.
The fascists in Congress are doing everything they can to lock in lifetime control of the country currently known as the United States and disenfranchise anyone not white male, cis-het, evangelical, and rabidly conservative. And Trump's bought and paid for SCOTUS will more than likely uphold this demolition of democracy.
First they came for the trans, then they came for the women, next they came for the immigrants and anyone brown, black, or speaking another language. SMH
I have contacted my two Senators and the Senate Minority Leader by phone and will be following up with the following:
The so-called SAVE Act is not an election security measure — it is a calculated assault on the fundamental right to vote. Under the false banner of “integrity,” this legislation erects deliberate barriers designed to silence millions of lawful voters, particularly seniors, students, married women who have changed their names, naturalized citizens, low-income Americans, and anyone lacking easy access to specific bureaucratic documents.
By demanding rigid proof-of-citizenship requirements that many eligible voters simply do not possess or cannot readily obtain, the SAVE Act transforms voting from a constitutional right into a paperwork obstacle course.
It invites mass disenfranchisement not through outright bans, but through administrative exclusion — the most insidious form of voter suppression because it hides behind technicalities while stripping real people of political power.
The bill forces election officials into impossible verification burdens, threatens voter registration systems that have functioned securely for decades, and risks purging legitimate voters from the rolls based on flawed data matching and bureaucratic error.
It undermines long-standing bipartisan systems like mail registration and voter assistance programs, replacing access with suspicion and participation with intimidation.
There is no credible evidence of widespread non-citizen voting that justifies these extreme measures.
The SAVE Act solves no real problem while creating a very real crisis: millions of eligible Americans placed at risk of losing their voice in their own democracy.
IF THS PASSES WE WILL NO LONGER HAVE FAIR AND FREE ELECTIONS
This is not election protection — it is election restriction. It weaponizes fear to justify exclusion and rewrites the rules of democracy so that participation becomes conditional rather than guaranteed.
A democracy that fears its voters is already in danger.
The SAVE Act moves the United States closer to that danger by making voting harder, narrower, and less representative of the people it is meant to serve. It must be recognized for what it is: a sweeping attempt to reshape the electorate by erecting barriers where the Constitution promises access.
"There is no credible evidence of widespread non-citizen voting that justifies these extreme measures."
SAY IT LOUDER FOR THOSE IN THE BACK!
"There is no credible evidence of widespread non-citizen voting"
Hell there's no evidence of even "spread," never mind "wide." Studies repeatedly and I would easily venture invariably show such non-citizen voting at tiny fractions of one percent.
In fact, just today (3/12) came news that in January, the DOJ dropped an investigation into claims of non-citizen voting in Nevada in 2020 after finding just 38 *possible* - not confirmed, just maybe - non-citizen voters. That's 0.003% of the vote.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fbi-closes-2020-election-fraud-inquiry-nevada/
Thanks, Erin, as always, for keeping us informed about these issues. This development is indeed disconcerting, to put it mildly.
The SAVE America Act will be the final nail in the coffin for democracy in America and will usher in an endless string of incompetent fascist administrations. And OF FUCKING COURSE they're using trans people as the vehicle in which to ram this highly unpopular and EXTREMELY dangerous bill through Congress. Because fascism cannot exist without a scapegoat to demonize, now can it?
To clarify: this is talking about gender affirming surgeries on kids and not gender affirming care for kids, right? Will puberty blockers and HRT still be available?
Yes they're talking about surgeries which are ALREADY not allowed by the WPATH. So yet again they are attempting to solve a problem that does not exist, or only exists in statistically insignificant numbers.
But you know how it is with fascists. Give them an inch and they'll take a mile so you know puberty blockers and HRT will be next on the Federal ban list.
"Yes they're talking about surgeries which are ALREADY not allowed by the WPATH"
We are not afforded the luxury of inaccuracy being ascribed to inadvertence. WPATH forbids no surgery at any particular age, but suggests endorsement for it per meeting criteria. It is difficult to see how any minor could qualify for surgery by those criteria until they were after the beginning of puberty and then had been on blockers for a year and HRT for another -- and as a practical matter "top surgery" is delayed until 15~16yo, and the only circumstance where genital surgery is endorsed for a minor is the summer of their 17th year so they can recover from surgery before leaving home for college. That latter circumstance is met only very rarely per year in the US, for example Jazz Jennings having surgery her 17th year.
We aren't allowed to get anything wrong, please be accurate and nuanced about the actual criteria for surgery. WPATH does not forbid surgery before age 18, it is just only very rarely endorsed per their protocols.
Ok thanks for the clarification.
Apparently, Cornyn has decided never to run again.
While there would be much short term pain for our side, the GOP ending the filibuster would be ending their party in the long run. When Dems take control we would pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and other laws that would end GOP gerrymandering. That said I am against ending the filibuster now due to rollback of rights that would follow
With something like this . . .
https://tiffinohio.net/posts/poll-amy-acton-leads-vivek-ramaswamy-by-10-in-ohio-governor-s-race/
. . . hanging over their head, is why I feel good about the Senate going 55/45 D to R, and a good quarter of the remaining Rs being nervous enough to go along with a purge of the executive and judiciary, ejecting Trump!'s MAGA altogether.
Remember per this, the Rs are 0 to 28 for flipping seats in recent special elections.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/dems-flip-28-state-legislature-seats-in-trump-20/ar-AA1Yv4KP
The GOPers quoted there are acting like they only need to motivate voters to show up who would never vote D. The proportion of I voters now going for D and the once fulminate MAGA voters who now feel betrayed are ignored there.
Good.
Let them be blindsided by the onrushing pyroclastic flow.