The Trump administration is unrolling a new initiative that will help prevent noncitizens from voting in U.S. elections.
It was announced last week that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services updated the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) program to ensure a single, reliable source for verifying immigration status and U.S. citizenship nationwide. Now, state and local officials can input Social Security numbers to help properly verify U.S. citizenship to prevent illegal aliens from voting in American elections.
“For years, states have pleaded for tools to help identify and stop aliens from hijacking our elections,” said USCIS Spokesman Matthew Tragesser. “Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Noem, USCIS is moving quickly to eliminate voter fraud. We expect further improvements soon and remain committed to restoring trust in American elections.”
This advancement came shortly after the DHS, USCIS, and DOGE SAVE optimization announcement and builds on efforts to remove roadblocks to securing the country’s election process by working to eliminate voter fraud.
The Trump administration hinted at more updates to come, saying; USCIS will continue to improve and add more capability and functionality to SAVE. Providing more tools within SAVE ensures state and local governments have robust and reliable access to federal databases to confirm the U.S. citizenship of individuals on their voting rolls and registering to vote, in support of President Trump’s March 25 EO 14248, Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.
SAVE, an online service administered by USCIS, allows various government agencies to verify the immigration status or U.S. naturalization of applicants seeking benefits or licenses.
The new partnership allows government agencies to create cases in SAVE using an applicant’s Social Security number rather than a DHS identifying number, which is not collected by a majority of state and local agencies. Additionally, agencies for the first time will be able to submit more than one case at a time, streamlining the process.
The new tool’s unveiling drew praise from the Tennessee Secretary of State’s office, which has been involved in a select group of states providing testing and feedback on these verification updates.
“I commend President Trump and his team for building a super tool for election officials to identify and remove ineligible voters,” TN Sec of State Tre Hargett said in a statement - “I predict this system, once fully developed, will be a game changer for election officials. Trump’s super election integrity tool means if you are an ineligible-registered voter in Tennessee, we will find you.”
Trump has also voiced strong support for the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, legislation sponsored by Texas GOP Rep. Chip Roy that requires states to obtain proof of citizenship prior to registering an individual for any federal election and also requires state officials to remove all noncitizens from existing voter rolls.
Roy’s bill passed the House in April (220-208), with only 4 Democrats supporting it, despite many high-profile cases of illegal foreigners voting in U.S. elections documented in recent months.
Federal prosecutors in April charged two Ukrainian nationals; 53-year-old Svitlana Demydenko and her 22-year-old daughter, Yelyzaveta Demydenko, with unlawfully voting in the 2024 presidential election. Akeel Abdul Jamiel, a 45-year-old Iraqi national, was accused by federal prosecutors that same month of participating in the 2020 presidential election.
Also, Texas, Alabama, Virginia and Ohio state officials identified as many as 17,000 noncitizens on state voting rolls and worked to remove them from the books ahead of the 2024 general election.
OF NOTE: America First Legal (AFL), a D.C.-based group aligned with the Trump administration, sued Maricopa County, AZ, in August 2024 after the county recorder failed to purge 35,000 registered voters who did not provide proof of U.S. citizenship.
Last year, AFL sued and won against AZ Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, for illegally withholding the list of over 218,000 people registered to vote without proof of citizenship required by law. The AZ Superior Court ordered Fontes to produce that list by Nov. 4, 2024.
Polling indicates that common sense voter protection regulations, such as requiring a photo ID to vote and providing proof of citizenship when registering to vote for the first time, are incredibly popular among Americans.
Accurate voter rolls are necessary for clean and transparent elections. Inaccurate rolls include deceased individuals, people who have moved out of state, and non-citizens, and can lead to election fraud, confusion on Election Day, misallocated ballots, unnecessary delays and other issues.
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