VOTE NO on the FALSE SOLUTION of HR 22: PROTECT VOTING RIGHTS & CONSTITUTIONAL DEMOCRACY!

The Issue

TO: Members of the United States Senate
We, the undersigned citizens of the United States, urgently call upon you to VOTE NO on HR 22, the so-called "Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act" (SAVE Act). This legislation is a solution in search of a problem—one that would disenfranchise 80-120 million eligible American voters while claiming to address noncitizen voting, a problem that state audits and national studies prove is vanishingly rare.

THE FALSE PREMISE: NONCITIZEN VOTING IS NOT A REAL PROBLEM
Proponents of HR 22 claim it's necessary to prevent noncitizen voting. The evidence proves otherwise.
State Audits Show Infinitesimal Rates
Multiple state-level investigations have found noncitizen voting to be extraordinarily rare:
Michigan (2024): 16 noncitizens voted out of 5.7 million ballots (0.00028%)
Georgia (2024): ~20 noncitizens identified on rolls of 8.2 million voters
Nevada (2016): 3 noncitizens voted out of 1.1 million ballots (0.0003%)
North Carolina (2016): 41 noncitizens out of 4.8 million votes (0.0008%)
Ohio (2015): 44 noncitizens voted over 15 years
National Studies Confirm Rarity
Brennan Center (2016): 30 suspected cases out of 23.5 million votes (0.0001%)
Department of Justice (2002-2005): Only 14 convictions nationwide over three years
Heritage Foundation Database: Only 41 cases over multiple decades
Why Noncitizens Don't Vote
Severe penalties: Noncitizen voting is a federal crime carrying prison time, massive fines, deportation, and permanent loss of naturalization eligibility.
Multiple verification systems: States already use DMV records and the federal SAVE database to verify eligibility.
No incentive: For noncitizens, the risk of losing legal status and family separation far outweighs casting one vote.
The Bottom Line
HR 22 creates barriers for 80-120 million eligible citizens to solve a problem affecting fewer than 0.001% of votes. This is policy equivalent to draining the ocean to find a seashell.

THE MASSIVE COST: 80-120 MILLION ELIGIBLE VOTERS AFFECTED
HR 22 would require documentary proof of citizenship that an estimated 80-120 million eligible American citizens currently lack—representing one-third to one-half of all registered voters.
Who Would Face Barriers
By Gender:
69 million women whose names changed due to marriage or divorce
By Economic Status:
80-100 million low-income Americans without passports (only 1 in 5 earning under $50,000 have one)
By Race and Ethnicity:
15-25 million voters of color (3x more likely than white citizens to lack required documents)
23 million naturalized citizens facing heightened scrutiny
By Age:
30 million young voters (18-24) with lower passport ownership
15-20 million college students living away from home
By Geography:
46 million rural voters facing travel burdens for in-person registration
By Circumstance:
21-25 million citizens without ready access to birth certificates or passports
35-40 million highly mobile Americans who move annually
By Civic Engagement:
Nonpartisan voter registration organizations
Election workers facing criminal penalties for administrative errors

THE PARTISAN DISTORTION: 16-36 MILLION VOTER DISADVANTAGE
The impact of HR 22 is not neutral—it creates systematic partisan advantage.
Party Affiliation of Affected Groups
Based on Pew Research Center and Harvard Youth Poll data:
Black voters: 83% Democratic
Hispanic voters: 61% Democratic
Young voters (18-24): 66% Democratic
Young voters (25-29): 64% Democratic
Young women: 47% prefer Democratic control (+19 point advantage)
Rural voters: 62% Republican
The Net Impact
With 80-120 million affected voters leaning 55-65% Democratic:
16-36 MILLION MORE DEMOCRATIC VOTERS WOULD FACE BARRIERS THAN REPUBLICAN VOTERS
To put this in perspective:
2020 popular vote margin: 7 million votes
HR 22's net impact: 2-5 times larger
Arizona 2020 margin: 10,457 votes
Georgia 2020 margin: 11,779 votes
Wisconsin 2020 margin: 20,682 votes
This isn't a thumb on the scale—it's replacing the scale entirely.

THE CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS: DESTROYING STRUCTURAL PROTECTIONS
How Our System Works
The Founders didn't prohibit one-party rule. Instead, they built structural protections:
Regular competitive elections allow power to shift
Staggered terms prevent sudden control
Federalism distributes power
Separation of powers creates competing power centers
These protections require one critical condition: free and fair elections where eligible citizens have roughly equal ballot access.
How HR 22 Breaks the System
When one party can systematically suppress 16-36 million opposition voters:
Staggered elections become meaningless (same disadvantage every cycle)
Federalism fails (federal mandate states cannot opt out of)
Separation of powers collapses (one party captures all branches)
Electoral accountability disappears (no mechanism for correction)
The Ratchet Effect
Once entrenched with this advantage, the controlling party can:
Entrench it further: Additional voting restrictions, gerrymandering
Capture institutions: Judicial appointments with lifetime terms
Reshape the electorate: Immigration policy, statehood decisions
Suppress opposition: Selective DOJ/IRS enforcement
Each step individually might be constitutional. Together, they prevent the electoral correction our Constitution depends on.
The Legal Standard
From Reynolds v. Sims (1964):
"The right to vote can be denied by a debasement or dilution of the weight of a citizen's vote just as effectively as by wholly prohibiting the free exercise of the franchise."
Courts have struck down voting laws with far less dramatic disparate impacts than HR 22 would create.

THE DISTINCTION THAT MATTERS
Constitutional: One party wins unified control through genuine popular support
Unconstitutional: One party manufactures control by creating systematic barriers for 16-36 million opposition voters, then uses that control to prevent electoral correction
The first is democracy. The second is democratic capture masquerading as procedural neutrality.

OUR DEMANDS
We call upon the United States Senate to:
VOTE NO on HR 22 when it comes to the Senate floor
Acknowledge the facts: Noncitizen voting occurs at rates of 0.00028-0.0008% and does not justify barriers for 80-120 million eligible citizens
Recognize the partisan impact: Creating a 16-36 million voter disadvantage for one party destroys competitive elections
Protect constitutional structure: Preserve the competitive elections that make all other constitutional safeguards functional
Reject false solutions: Do not trade away voting rights to solve a problem that doesn't exist

CONCLUSION
HR 22 is legislative fiction masquerading as election security:
The problem is fake: Noncitizen voting affects fewer than 0.001% of ballots
The cost is massive: 80-120 million eligible voters face new barriers
The impact is partisan: 16-36 million more Democratic voters affected
The damage is structural: Destroys the competitive elections our Constitution depends on
This is not election integrity—it is election manipulation on an unprecedented scale.
State audits from Michigan to Georgia to Nevada prove noncitizen voting is vanishingly rare. Every state already has effective verification systems. We don't need HR 22's sledgehammer approach that shatters voting rights for tens of millions to catch fewer than a dozen bad actors per state.
When one party can systematically disenfranchise 16-36 million opposition voters while claiming procedural neutrality, the Constitution's protections against tyranny become theoretical rather than functional.
We urge the Senate to vote NO on HR 22 and protect both voting rights and the constitutional democracy that depends on competitive elections.