I have written several postings related to Various topics involving elections and voting in America. A list of links have been provided at bottom of this article for your convenience. This article will, however address additional issues in these topics.
Immigration, one of the most politically divisive and complex matters in the U.S. for decades, is emerging as a top issue in the 2024 election.
Look no further than Iowa and New Hampshire, two early-voting states thousands of miles from the southwest border.
Voters there ranked immigration nearly as important as the economy when asked which issue mattered most in deciding how to vote in the Republican presidential contests.
“I think overall the most important thing to me is securing the borders, national security,” Bill Collins of Bedford, New Hampshire, told ABC News at a polling place on Tuesday.
Border security was a centerpiece of Donald Trump‘s successful 2016 campaign, and he is now repeating those messages (and in many cases going further than he did eight years ago, accused of echoing Hitler in saying immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country”) to energize and unite his supporters against what Republicans have dubbed “Biden’s border crisis.”
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden is facing rancor within his own party as Democratic leaders in New York and Illinois are forced to deal with the fallout from busloads of migrants being sent to their cities by Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott amid a historic influx of border crossings.
“In his entire administration, it has eclipsed everything else,” said Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute.
Migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border reached a record high of 302,000 in December and apprehensions hit historic peak of 2.2 million in fiscal year 2022. Over 100,000 migrants have been transported to cities like Washington, Los Angeles and New York.
Images of migrants lining the streets in Manhattan or Chicago helped shift perceptions of the issue from a far-away problem to a daily close-reminder of border tumult, making it even more potent than in prior cycles.
“This is where it’s different from any other chapter in our history,” Chishti said.
“When you have an organic absorption of migrants in society, it doesn’t get noticed. But when you have sudden, dramatic groups of people showing up then it becomes a different kind of problem,” Chishti added.
Polls show immigration is a major political vulnerability for Biden. He has just an 18% approval rating on the issue, the lowest for any president since ABC News and the Washington Post began asking the question in January 2004.
An ABC News/Ipsos survey conducted last November, one year out from Election Day, showed Republicans were generally more trusted to do a better job than Democrats when it came to handling immigration. At the same time, nearly a third of U.S. adults said they didn’t trust either party to effectively deal with the issue.
Biden’s apparent shift
Biden campaigned as Trump’s foil on immigration, promising to put an end to controversial policies like those that led to families being separated at the border. Shortly after he entered office, he sent a bill to Congress, he said, to “restore humanity and American values to our immigration system.”
But now, amid relentless attacks from critics for his handling of the border, he is entertaining negotiations with Republicans on a compromise immigration bill in exchange for unlocking urgent aid to Ukraine. While hosting mayors at the White House last week, Biden said he is open to “massive changes” to solve the problem at the border, including reforms to asylum laws.
Some congressional Democrats have already aired frustrations with the administration, though no bill text has been released or announced. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus, led by Rep. Nanette Diaz Barragán, called on Biden to “reject Trump-era immigration policies” being pursued by Republicans, saying it’s “unconscionable that the President would consider going back on his word to enact what amounts to a ban on asylum.”
Biden’s apparent shift “appeals to moderates and independents in the electorate but does risk alienating more progressive members of the party,” said Louis DeSipio, a political science and Chicano-Latino professor at UC Irvine.
“Biden’s on a tightrope with this issue,” DeSipio said. “It’s the first time in quite a while that Democrats have had this level of internal division over immigration.”
While a bipartisan deal could deflate the GOP’s talking point that Biden hasn’t sufficiently tackled the issue, there’s the looming question of whether it will happen at all. Trump has urged Republicans not to accept whatever is worked out between Senate negotiators and the Biden administration. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who speaks to Trump frequently on the issue, has said he doesn’t believe now is the time for comprehensive reform. Instead, Johnson has said Biden should use executive action to address the border.
“It’s an issue that Republicans are going to run on but not legislate on,” said Douglas Rivlin, the senior communications director at America’s Voice, a progressive immigration advocacy group.
Biden and the White House are pushing back on Republicans signaling opposition.
“They have to choose whether they want to solve a problem or keep weaponizing the issue to score political points against the president,” Biden said last week.
According to reporters in the room, when asked if the border was secure, Biden replied, “No.” He also said “no” when asked if his administration’s policies have caused any of the problems.
Some immigration activists have accused Biden and Democrats of letting Republicans take control of the narrative.
“Time and time again, what I keep seeing in our polling and in our research is that Americans are just not hearing from Democrats,” said Beatriz Lopez, the deputy director with the Immigration Hub.
Lopez said the group urged Biden’s team to not cede too much ground in border negotiations to GOP demands, and instead refocus on rebuilding its coalition and reminding voters what’s at stake in 2024.
“You’re not going to win by out-Republican the Republicans,” Lopez said. “You’re going to win by leaning into good pragmatic solutions, reminding people of our shared values and countering the anti-immigrant rhetoric. That’s the formula.”
Trump ramps up anti-immigrant rhetoric
Trump appears even more emboldened this campaign on a number of issues, with immigration at the forefront.
If elected, Trump has said he plans to crack down severely on both legal and illegal immigration. He has vowed to carry out the “largest domestic deportation in American History” and to sign an executive order ending birthright citizenship — both of which would face significant legal challenges, if not be practically impossible to implement.
He’s not only gone so far as to suggest migrants are “poisoning the blood of our country,” more recently he’s describing migrants coming to the border as dangerous people coming from “insane asylums” being emptied out around the world. CNN reported earlier this year that his campaign could provide no evidence to back up his claims.
But his message of an immigrant “invasion” appears to be resonating among some Republicans.
Debbe Magee, a Trump supporter, cited the border as her most important issue while attending one of his rallies in New Hampshire.
“We’re not safe,” Magee said.
DeSipio said Trump, both during his presidency and in the years since, has “captured the fear of the change that was coming to the country” with migration over the past few decades and amplified it.
“It has resonated with Republicans since 2016, and now increasingly with some independents and some Democrats,” DeSipio said, though he noted it could do more harm than good among independents and moderates.
Proving the GOP’s embrace of Trump’s proposals, there was little daylight between him and his GOP rivals on how to approach the issue if elected.
While the issue helped to first propel Trump into the White House, it wasn’t as successful in 2018 or 2020. Trump and other Republicans made a migrant caravan moving toward the U.S. a rallying cry in 2018, though Democrats flipped control of the House with a net gain of more than 40 seats. In the 2020 election, immigration issues were largely overshadowed by the COVID-19 pandemic and economy.
But as the 2024 race increasingly turns to a likely rematch between Trump and Biden, Trump is going all in criticizing his chief rival on his management of the border.
“We have millions and millions of people flowing into our country illegally,” Trump said in his New Hampshire victory speech. “We have no idea who the hell they are. They come from prisons and they come from mental institutions. And it’s just killing our country.”
GOP sounds alarm on ‘noncitizen voting’ in its 2024 election strategy
One political party is holding urgent news conferences and congressional hearings over the topic. The other says it’s a dangerous distraction meant to seed doubts before this year’s presidential election.
In recent months, the specter of immigrants voting illegally in the U.S. has erupted into a leading election-year talking point for Republicans. They argue that legislation is necessary to protect the sanctity of the vote as the country faces unprecedented levels of illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Voting by people who are not U.S. citizens already is illegal in federal elections and there is no indication it’s happening anywhere in significant numbers. Yet Republican lawmakers at the federal and state levels are throwing their energy behind the issue, introducing legislation and fall ballot measures. The activity ensures the issue will remain at the forefront of voters’ minds in the months ahead.
Republicans in Congress are pushing a bill called the SAVE (Safeguard American Voter Eligibility) Act that would require proof of citizenship to register to vote. Meanwhile, Republican legislatures in at least six states have placed noncitizen voting measures on the Nov. 5 ballot, while at least two more are debating whether to do so.
“American elections are for American citizens, and we intend to keep it that way,” House Administration Committee Chair Rep. Bryan Steil of Wisconsin said during a hearing he hosted on the topic this past week.
Democrats on the committee lambasted their Republican colleagues for focusing on what they called a “nonissue,” arguing it was part of a strategy with former President Donald Trump to lay the groundwork for election challenges this fall.
“It appears the lesson Republicans learned from the fiasco that the former president caused in 2020 was not ‘Don’t steal an election’ — it was just ‘Start earlier,’” said New York Rep. Joe Morelle, the committee’s top Democrat. “The coup starts here. This is where it begins.”
The concern that immigrants who are not eligible to vote are illegally casting ballots has prevailed on the right for years. But it gained renewed attention earlier this year when Trump began suggesting without evidence that Democrats were encouraging illegal migration to the U.S. so they could register the newcomers to vote.
Republicans who have been vocal about voting by those who are not citizens have demurred when asked for evidence that it’s a problem. Last week, during a news conference on his federal legislation to require proof of citizenship during voter registration, House Speaker Mike Johnson couldn’t provide examples of the crime happening.
“The answer is that it’s unanswerable,” the Louisiana Republican said in response to a question about whether such people were illegally voting. “We all know, intuitively, that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections, but it’s not been something that is easily provable.”
Election administration experts say it’s not only provable, but it’s been demonstrated that the number of noncitizens voting in federal elections is infinitesimal.
To be clear, there have been cases over the years of noncitizens illegally registering and even casting ballots. But states have mechanisms to catch that. Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose recently found 137 suspected noncitizens on the state’s rolls — out of roughly 8 million voters — and is taking action to confirm and remove them, he announced this past week.
In 2022, Georgia’s Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, conducted an audit of his state’s voter rolls specifically looking for noncitizens. His office found that 1,634 had attempted to register to vote over a period of 25 years, but election officials had caught all the applications and none had been able to register.
In North Carolina in 2016, an audit of elections found that 41 legal immigrants who had not yet become citizens cast ballots, out of 4.8 million total ballots cast. The votes didn’t make a difference in any of the state’s elections.
Voters must confirm under penalty of perjury that they are citizens when they register to vote. If they lie, they can face fines, imprisonment or deportation, said David Becker, founder and executive director of the nonprofit Center for Election Innovation and Research.
On top of that, anyone registering provides their Social Security number, driver’s license or state ID, Becker said. That means they already have shown the government proof of citizenship to receive those documents, or if they are a noncitizen with a state ID or Social Security number, they have been clearly classified that way in the state’s records.
“What they’re asking for is additional proof,” Becker said of Republicans pushing Johnson’s bill. “Why should people have to go to multiple government agencies and have them ask, ’Show us your papers,’ when they’ve already shown them?”
Democrats fear adding more ID requirements could disenfranchise eligible voters who don’t have their birth certificates or Social Security cards on hand. Republicans counter that the extra step could provide another layer of security and boost voter confidence in an imperfect system in which noncitizen voters have slipped through in the past.
The national focus on noncitizen voting also has brought attention to a related, but different phenomenon: how a small number of local jurisdictions, among them San Francisco and the District of Columbia, have begun allowing immigrants who aren’t citizens to vote in some local contests, such as for school board and city council.
The number of noncitizen voters casting ballots in the towns and cities where they are allowed to do so has been minimal so far. In Winooski, Vermont, where 1,345 people cast ballots in a recent local election, just 11 were not citizens, the clerk told The Associated Press. Still, the gradually growing phenomenon has prompted some state lawmakers to introduce ballot measures that seek to stop cities from trying this in the future.
In South Carolina, voters in November will decide on a constitutional amendment that supporters say will shut the door on any noncitizens voting. The state’s constitution currently says every citizen aged 18 and over who qualifies to vote can. The amendment changes the phrasing to say “only citizens.”
Republican state Sen. Chip Campsen called it a safeguard to prevent future problems. California has similar wording to South Carolina’s current provision, and Campsen cited a California Supreme Court decision that ruled “every” didn’t prevent noncitizens from voting.
Democratic state Sen. Darrell Jackson asked Campsen during the debate last month, “Do we have that problem here in South Carolina?”
“You don’t have the problem until the problem arises,” Campsen replied.
On Friday, legislative Republicans in Missouri passed a ballot measure for November that would ban both noncitizen voting and ranked-choice voting.
“I know that scary hypotheticals have been thrown out there: ‘Well, what about St. Louis? What about Kansas City?’” said Democratic state Sen. Lauren Arthur of Kansas City. “It is not a real threat because this is already outlawed. It’s already illegal in Missouri.”
Asked by a Democrat on Thursday about instances of noncitizens voting in Missouri, Republican Rep. Alex Riley said he didn’t have “specific data or a scenario that it has happened,” but wanted to “address the concern that it could happen in the future.”
In Wisconsin, an important presidential swing state where the Republican-controlled Legislature also put a noncitizen voting measure on the ballot this fall, Democratic state Rep. Lee Snodgrass said during a hearing earlier this week that she couldn’t understand why someone who is not a legal citizen would vote.
“I’m trying to wrap my brain around what people think the motivation would be for a noncitizen to go through an enormous amount of hassle to actively commit a felony to vote in an election that’s going to end up putting them in prison or be deported,” she said.
Four Things to Know about Noncitizen Voting
In recent years, heightened scrutiny has targeted the integrity of election processes, particularly regarding noncitizen participation in U.S. elections. We address here four frequently asked questions concerning noncitizens voting in American elections:
- Can noncitizens vote?
- How do election offices verify voters’ citizenship status?
- What are penalties for voting as a noncitizen?
- Have there been documented cases of noncitizen voting?
Can noncitizens vote?
The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, explicitly prohibits noncitizens from voting in federal elections. It is not legal in any state for a noncitizen to cast a ballot in a federal election. Any instance of illegally cast ballots by noncitizens has been investigated by the appropriate authorities, and there is no evidence that these votes—or any other instances of voter fraud—have been significant enough to impact any election’s outcome.
While federal law does not prohibit noncitizens from casting a ballot in state or local elections, no state currently allows noncitizens to vote in statewide elections. Three states and Washington, DC, have municipalities that allow noncitizens to vote in certain local elections. San Francisco allows resident noncitizen parents and guardians to vote in school board elections. Oakland is currently attempting to enact a similar law. Some cities in Maryland and Vermont permit noncitizens to vote in municipal elections. New York City enacted a law allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections in 2021, but it was ruled unconstitutional by a state judge in 2022. Washington, DC, recently enacted a law to allow noncitizen residents to vote in all non-federal elections.
As voting in federal and state elections is limited to citizens, communities that do allow noncitizens to vote maintain processes to ensure that a registered noncitizen voter cannot receive a ballot for state or federal races. Maryland’s cities, for example, maintain separate ballots for municipal elections. This ensures that noncitizens, who may only vote in certain local elections, cannot receive a ballot for state or federal contests.
How do election offices verify voters’ citizenship status?
The process of verifying voter citizenship varies across the United States. The National Voter Registration Act of 1993 requires states to use a common voter registration form, which includes under penalty of perjury an attestation that the applicant is a U.S. citizen.
States verify voter identity and information using state and/or federal databases, such as the Social Security Administration or state departments of motor vehicles. By cross-referencing information that the voter provides against information provided by these entities, election administrators can ensure that identifying information submitted on voter registration forms is accurate and legitimate. This hinders those who may attempt to register to vote using fraudulent or false information.
What are penalties for voting as a noncitizen? Does voting by a noncitizen affect their immigration status?
Illegally voting in a federal election can result in a fine and up to one year in federal prison. Additionally, a noncitizen found guilty of this crime may face deportation and revocation of their legal status under immigration law. Finally, falsely claiming U.S. citizenship for the purpose of registering to vote may also result in deportation or denial of future immigration status.
Deterrence is an important factor in ensuring compliance with voting laws. The consequences for breaking federal election law can have a profound effect on noncitizens. They could face prison time and deportation for illegal voting as well as denial of future immigration status, including naturalization. The risk of identification and punishment generally deters the behavior.
Have there been documented cases of noncitizens voting?
The Heritage Foundation’s analysis of legal actions regarding election conduct found only 24 instances of noncitizens voting between 2003 and 2023. A study conducted by the Brennan Center for Justice analyzing 23.5 million votes across 42 jurisdictions in the 2016 general election concluded that there were approximately 30 instances of noncitizens casting votes. Any instance of illegally cast ballots by noncitizens has been investigated by the appropriate authorities, and there is no evidence that these votes—or any other instances of voter fraud—have been significant enough to impact any election’s outcome.
Laws permitting noncitizens to vote in the United States
According to the Pew Research Center, there were over 25 million people living in the U.S. in 2020 who were not U.S. citizens. This included approximately 12 million permanent residents living in the U.S. with legal permission, as well as 2 million temporary residents visiting the U.S. for a period of time as students, tourists, foreign workers, foreign officials, etc. Pew’s figure also includes approximately 11 million immigrants living in the U.S. illegally.
In 1996, the U.S. Congress passed a law prohibiting noncitizens from voting in federal elections, including elections for the U.S. House, U.S. Senate, and presidential elections. This law does not apply to elections for state and local offices.
According to political scientist Ron Hayduk of San Francisco State University, certain noncitizens were permitted to vote in federal, state, and local elections in 33 states between 1776 and 1924. He argued that granting the right to vote to noncitizens was a common incentive among U.S. territories and new states to attract workers and families to work and populate the lands.
Hayduk also argued that immigration can lead to anti-immigrant sentiment and restricted voting rights:
| “ | Contrary to the dominant narrative about a consistent expansion of democracy and political participation in the United States, the history of immigrant suffrage provides a more accurate lens to expose a recurring pattern that runs throughout the history of American voting rights: one step forward and two steps back. An influx of newer immigrants at a point in time sparks a wave of nationalism and nativism—often associated with war or political conflict—and a rollback of voting rights. | ” |
States began changing their constitutions to prevent noncitizen voting in the early Twentieth Century. Alabama (1901), Colorado (1902), Wisconsin (1908), Oregon (1914), Kansas (1918), Nebraska (1918), South Dakota (1918), Indiana (1921), Texas (1921), Mississippi (1924), Missouri (1924), and Arkansas (1926) all banned noncitizen voting within three decades. By 1931, noncitizen voting had become so rare that political scientist Leon Aylsworth noted, “For the first time in over a hundred years, a national election was held in 1928 in which no alien in any state had the right to cast a vote for a candidate for any office – national, state, or local.”
Decades later in 1996, the U.S. Congress passed a federal immigration enforcement bill called the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA). Section 611 of IIRAIRA criminalized noncitizen voting in federal elections, but the law did not explicitly prohibit noncitizens from voting in state or local elections in accordance with state constitutions and local ordinances.
When the IIRIRA took effect on April 1, 1997, Former President Bill Clinton said that the legislation strengthened “the rule of law by cracking down on illegal immigration at the border, in the workplace, and in the criminal justice system — without punishing those living in the United States legally.” However, critics of the IIRIRA said that it “eliminate[ed] due process from the overwhelming majority of removal cases and curtailing equitable relief from removal.”
According to Policy and Advocacy Manager Arturo Castellanos Canales of the National Immigration Forum, the City of Takoma Park, Maryland, became the first municipality in the country to restore noncitizen voting in local elections in 1992. “From a legal standpoint, Takoma Park argued that Maryland’s constitution expressly delegates municipalities the power to determine suffrage qualifications for municipal elections in their city charters. In addition, from a practical perspective, Takoma Park argued that citizenship was an irrelevant suffrage qualification when voting for local officials because they deal with local responsibilities, such as parks and recreation, arts programs, public transportation, garbage collection, water, and sewage.”
Voters in San Francisco passed a charter amendment called Proposition N in 2016, giving noncitizens the right to vote in the city’s school board elections. An official statement of support for the measure said, “All parents, regardless of citizenship, will have the opportunity to become an integral part of their child’s education through the voting process. It is estimated that at least 1 out of 3 children in SF public schools has an immigrant parent. Tens of thousands of SF residents would become eligible to vote in School Board elections.”
An official statement opposing Proposition N said, “Like a bad penny, this illegal proposal in violation of the California Elections Code has already been twice defeated by increasing majorities of San Francisco electors – but keeps coming back!!!: It was defeated in 2004 and 2010 … Needless to say, American citizens living abroad are not allowed to take part in foreign nations’ board of education or other elections.”
After Tacoma Park and San Francisco, other municipalities allowed noncitizens to vote in their local elections: New York (2021), Montpelier (2021), Winooski (2021), Oakland (2022), Washington, D.C. (2022), Burlington (2023). Opponents of these policies filed lawsuits at both the state and federal levels to stop noncitizens from voting, arguing that their participation diminished the voting power of legal citizens. This litigation had mixed results. New York’s noncitizen voting law was overturned in 2022. San Francisco’s law was upheld on appeal in 2023.
In 2018, North Dakota became the first of several states to ban noncitizen voting by changing their constitutions. North Dakotans for Citizen Voting, the group that sponsored Measure 2, supported the ballot measure in posts on its website:
| “ | Currently the constitution doesn’t state that only U.S. citizens can vote – it says that U.S. citizens are eligible to vote. This measure clarifies it. There have been a few cases around the state where county auditors sought clarification … Voting is the fundamental and exclusive right of U.S. citizens. We welcome many people who choose to live temporarily or even permanently in North Dakota, or elsewhere in the United States. But if they want to vote in our elections, they should make the decision to become a U.S. citizen and go through that process. This initiative doesn’t deal with immigration or the problem of voter fraud. Our goal is simple and straightforward: make voting the exclusive right of U.S. citizens. People who support voting as the basic, fundamental right of U.S. citizens will support this ballot measure, and those who want non-citizens to vote will oppose it.[9][6] | ” |
Opponents of Measure 2, including Steven Morrison, a law professor at the University of North Dakota, stated that the measure was unnecessary, “Practically speaking, I don’t see how this would change anything. The question is do you have non-residents, non-citizens voting now?”
After North Dakota, other states passed bans on noncitizen voting, including Alabama (2020), Colorado (2022), Arizona (2022), Florida (2022), Louisiana (2023), and Ohio (2023). Voters in four additional states are deciding similar ballot measure bans in 2024: Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, and South Carolina.
Noncitizen voting in the United States
The map below indicates which U.S. states allow or prohibit noncitizen voting in elections for state or local offices. It also indicates which states have approved ballot measures related to noncitizen voting and which states will have ballot measures related to noncitizen voting in the 2024 election. States with no impediments to voting in local elections are also indicated on this map.
Details about noncitizen voting in local elections
As of June 2024, the District of Columbia and municipalities in California, Maryland, and Vermont allowed noncitizens to vote in some or all local elections. Details about each municipality are listed below.
California
- Oakland: In 2022, voters in Oakland approved a charter amendment that read, “Shall the measure to amend the City Charter to allow the City Council by adopting an ordinance, to authorize voting by noncitizen residents, who are the parents, legal guardians, or legally recognized caregivers of a child, for the Office of Oakland School Board Director if they are otherwise eligible to vote under state and local law be adopted?” The amendment was approved with 67% support. The law took effect in 2023.
- San Francisco: In 2016, voters in San Francisco passed a charter amendment called Proposition N with 54% support. The amendment read, “Shall the City allow a non-citizen resident of San Francisco who is of legal voting age and the parent, legal guardian or legally recognized caregiver of a child living in the San Francisco Unified School District to vote for members of the Board of Education?” The law took effect in 2018. San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard B. Ulmer, Jr. struck down Proposition N in July 2022, stating that the law violated the state Constitution. Ulmer ruled that “the [California] Constitution … reserves the right to vote to a United States citizen, contrary to (the) San Francisco ordinance.” A California Court of Appeal overturned Ulmer’s ruling a few months later, arguing that Prop N was in fact permissible under the state constitution and the City Charter. According to the city of San Francisco’s website, “On August 8, 2023, a California Court of Appeal upheld San Francisco’s non-citizen voting program. The decision permits non-citizen parents of children residing in San Francisco to continue to vote in San Francisco Board of Education Elections.”
District of Columbia
The District of Columbia Council passed the D.C. Noncitizen Vote Act in October 2022, allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections. Due to the District’s non-state status, all of its legislation must be reviewed by Congress prior to adoption. The D.C. Noncitizen Vote Act overcame bipartisan opposition in the U.S. House of Representatives and passed its congressional review in March 2023.
Advocates of the law argued that noncitizens have an interest in schools, public safety and other issues, and should therefore be allowed to weigh in on public policy decisions. Opponents argued that noncitizens do not have a fundamental right to vote or hold public office in the U.S. and that the legislation dilutes the voting power of U.S. citizens.
In March 2023, a group of seven D.C. voters filed a lawsuit in D.C. Superior Court seeking an injunction to prevent the law from being enforced. The case was moved to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.[13][14]
On March 20, 2024 the court dismissed the challenge. In its opinion, the court held that the plaintiffs “votes will not receive less weight or be treated differently than noncitizens’ votes; they are not losing representation in any legislative body; nor have citizens as a group been discriminatorily gerrymandered, ‘packed,’ or ‘cracked’ to divide, concentrate, or devalue their votes.”
Maryland
Maryland’s state constitution specifies that “every citizen of the United States, of the age of 18 years or upwards, who is a resident of the State as of the time for the closing of registration next preceding the election, shall be entitled to vote in the ward or election district in which the citizen resides at all elections to be held in this State.” The state constitution gives municipalities the authority to allow people outside those qualifications to vote without requiring state approval of such changes.
The following Maryland municipalities allow noncitizens to vote in local elections as of June 2024:
- Barnesville: The Barnesville town charter defines qualified voters as “having resided therein for six months previous to any town election and being eighteen years of age.”
- Cheverly: Any person over the age of 18 who has been a resident of Cheverly for at least 30 days at the time of the election and has not been convicted of a crime is eligible to register to vote in town elections.
- Chevy Chase Section 3: The charter of Chevy Chase Section 3 reads, “‘Qualified Voter’ shall mean any person who is a resident of Chevy Chase Section 3, without regard to citizenship, and is at least eighteen (18) years of age.”
- Garrett Park: The Garrett Park town charter reads, “The town manager shall provide for the registration of voters in a flexible and available manner in order to encourage registration and voting, consistent with the policies adopted by ordinance and the rules and procedures specified by the election judges. Qualified persons may register by universal registration with either Montgomery County or the town, or may register only with the town, including residents who are not citizens of the United States, up to and including election day.”
- Glen Echo: Glen Echo’s town charter says the following: “Any person who is not a United States citizen, and (a) is a resident of the Town of Glen Echo, (b) is a lawful resident of the United States, and (c) except for the United States citizenship requirement, meets the voter qualifications provided in Section 501(a) may register to vote in Town elections.”
- Hyattsville: The Hyattsville town website states, “Hyattsville residents who are not U.S. citizens, or do not wish to register with the State, may use the Hyattsville City Voter Registration Form.”
- Martin’s Additions: The Martin’s Additions town charter says, “‘Qualified Voter’ is any person who owns property or any resident of Martin’s Additions who is eighteen (18) years of age or over.”
- Mount Rainier: Mount Rainier’s city charter states that any person who has been a city resident for 30 days or more at the time of a local election, is at least 18 years old, has not been convicted of a felony offense or of buying and selling votes, and is not under mental guardianship may register to vote.
- Riverdale Park: Riverdale Park’s town charter states, “(a) Every resident of the town who (1) has the Town of Riverdale Park as his or her primary residence, (2) is at least sixteen (16) years of age, (3) has resided within the corporate limits of the town for at least forty-five (45) days immediately preceding any nonrunoff town election, (4) does not claim the right to vote elsewhere in the United States, (5) has not been found by a court to be unable to communicate a desire to vote, and (6) is registered to vote in accordance with the provisions of § 503 of this charter shall be a qualified voter of the Town.”
- Somerset: The Somerset town charter says, “Every person who (1) is at least eighteen years of age, (2) has resided within the corporate limits of the town for fourteen days next preceding any election, and (3) is registered in accordance with the provisions of this Charter, shall be a qualified voter of the town. Every qualified voter of the town shall be entitled to vote at any or all town elections.”
- Takoma Park: The Takoma Park city website states, “City residents who are not citizens of the United States can register to vote in Takoma Park elections by completing the Takoma Park Voter Registration Application.”
Vermont
The following Vermont municipalities allow noncitizens to vote in local elections as of June 2024:
- Burlington: On March 9, 2023, the city of Burlington approved a charter amendment extending the right to vote to its noncitizen residents. Although Governor Phil Scott vetoed the legislation, both chambers of the state legislature voted to override that veto on June 30. The law took immediate effect.
- Montpelier: On June 24, 2021, H177 was enacted into law, approving a Montpelier city charter amendment authorizing legal residents to vote in city elections. Although Governor Phil Scott (R) vetoed the legislation, both chambers of the state legislature voted to override that veto. The law took immediate effect.
- Winooski: On June 24, 2021, H 227 was enacted into law, approving a Winooski city charter amendment authorizing legal residents to vote in city and school district elections. Although Governor Phil Scott vetoed the legislation, both chambers of the state legislature voted to override that veto. The law took immediate effect.
States where noncitizen voting is prohibited
As of June 2024, the following seven states included language explicitly prohibiting noncitizen voting in their state constitutions.
States with no impediments to noncitizen voting in local elections
Joshua A. Douglas, associate professor of law at the University of Kentucky College of Law, published an article in 2017 stating, “Municipalities can expand voting rights in local elections if there are no explicit state constitutional or legislative impediments and so long as local jurisdictions have the power of home rule.” Some states, for example, require that changes to local charters get approval from state legislatures, thereby limiting municipal authority over voter eligibility laws, whereas other states do not.
Douglas identified 14 states—including California and Maryland—as posing no clear impediments to municipalities passing their own voter qualification laws. Since publication of the 2017 article, two states which Douglas identified as having no clear impediments to noncitizen voting have passed constitutional amendments clarifying that only U.S. citizens may vote in elections in those states. The remaining 12 states identified by Douglas are:
- Arkansas
- California
- Illinois
- Maryland
- Nevada
- New Jersey
- New Mexico
- Oklahoma
- Rhode Island
- South Dakota
- Washington
- Wisconsin
Federal law on voting and citizenship
Federal law states that it is unlawful for a noncitizen to vote in federal elections and establishes the punishment of a fine, one year in prison, or both for violation of the law. The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 states the following:
| “ | (a) It shall be unlawful for any alien to vote in any election held solely or in part for the purpose of electing a candidate for the office of President, Vice President, Presidential elector, Member of the Senate, Member of the House of Representatives, Delegate from the District of Columbia, or Resident Commissioner, unless—(1) the election is held partly for some other purpose;(2) aliens are authorized to vote for such other purpose under a State constitution or statute or a local ordinance; and(3) voting for such other purpose is conducted independently of voting for a candidate for such Federal offices, in such a manner that an alien has the opportunity to vote for such other purpose, but not an opportunity to vote for a candidate for any one or more of such Federal offices.(b) Any person who violates this section shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than one year, or both. | ” |
The law includes the following exceptions:
| “ | (c) Subsection (a) does not apply to an alien if—(1) each natural parent of the alien (or, in the case of an adopted alien, each adoptive parent of the alien) is or was a citizen (whether by birth or naturalization);(2) the alien permanently resided in the United States prior to attaining the age of 16; and(3) the alien reasonably believed at the time of voting in violation of such subsection that he or she was a citizen of the United States. | ” |
Federal law also states that noncitizens who violate the law are inadmissible (ineligible to receive visas and ineligible to be admitted to the U.S.) and deportable.
State constitutions on voting and citizenship
All state constitutions mention United States citizenship when discussing who can vote in that state’s elections. In 46 states, constitutional language discussing citizenship says who can vote (e.g. “every citizen” or “all citizens”), but does not state that noncitizens cannot vote. In Arizona, Louisiana, North Dakota, and Ohio, the state constitutions provide that citizens, but not noncitizens, have the right to vote.
The following table lists what each state’s constitution says regarding citizenship and the right to vote. Click the arrow to browse pages in the chart or search for a state within the chart.
Ballot measures on noncitizen voting
Since 2018, voters have decided on six ballot measures related to adding language about citizenship requirements for voting. Voters approved each one.
Noteworthy events
Noncitizen voting in San Francisco upheld by California Court of Appeal (2023)
According to the city of San Francisco’s website, non-citizen parents of children residing in San Francisco are permitted to vote in San Francisco Board of Education elections. Noncitizens are not permitted to vote in other local, state, or federal elections.
In 2016, voters in San Francisco passed a charter amendment called Proposition N with 54% support. The amendment read, “Shall the City allow a non-citizen resident of San Francisco who is of legal voting age and the parent, legal guardian or legally recognized caregiver of a child living in the San Francisco Unified School District to vote for members of the Board of Education?” The law took effect in 2018. San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard B. Ulmer, Jr. struck down Proposition N in July 2022, stating that the law violated the state Constitution. Ulmer ruled that “the [California] Constitution … reserves the right to vote to a United States citizen, contrary to (the) San Francisco ordinance.”
A California Court of Appeal overturned Ulmer’s ruling a few months later, arguing that Prop N was in fact permissible under the state constitution and the City Charter. According to the city of San Francisco’s website, “On August 8, 2023, a California Court of Appeal upheld San Francisco’s non-citizen voting program. The decision permits non-citizen parents of children residing in San Francisco to continue to vote in San Francisco Board of Education Elections.”
Noncitizen voting declared unconstitutional in New York (2022)
On December 9, 2021, the New York City Council approved Int. 1867-2020, which extended the right to vote in municipal elections to lawful permanent residents and other non-citizens authorized to work in the United States. The council voted 33-14 in favor of the legislation, making New York City the largest city in the nation at the time to authorize voting by non-citizens.
Mayor Eric Adams (D) allowed the legislation to become law without his signature on January 9, 2022, saying, “I believe that New Yorkers should have a say in their government, which is why I have and will continue to support this important legislation. … I look forward to bringing millions more into the democratic process.”[41][42]
A group of Republican voters and officials representing the New York Republican State Committee and Republican National Committee, as well as a Democratic city council member, filed a lawsuit on January 10, 2023, challenging the new law. The plaintiffs alleged that allowing over 800,000 eligible noncitizens to vote in municipal elections when New York City has approximately five million registered voters would dilute the power of the votes of legitimate U.S. citizens.
On June 27, 2022, the New York State Supreme Court for Staten Island overturned the law, ruling that it violated the state’s constitution. According to Judge Ralph Porzio, “by not expressly including non-citizens in the New York State Constitution, it was the intent of the framers for non-citizens to be omitted.” The judge quoted Article 2.1 and Article 2.5 of the state’s constitution in his judgment:
On February 21, 2024, the Appellate Division for the Second Judicial Department in New York upheld the lower court’s decision upon appeal In the ruling, associate justice Paul Wooten said, “We determine that this local law was enacted in violation of the New York State Constitution and Municipal Home Rule Law, and thus, must be declared null and void.”
The Supreme Court of the State of New York includes 62 separate courts—one for each county. These courts are the highest trial courts in the state but they are not New York’s courts of last resort. The Court of Appeals is the highest court and court of last resort in New York.
State election laws are changing. Keeping track of the latest developments in all 50 states can seem like an impossible job.
Biden’s new immigration plan: How will it work?
Joe Biden’s latest plan, announced ahead of the 2024 election, gives some undocumented migrants a pathway to United States citizenship.
United States President Joe Biden has announced an initiative that can offer citizenship to roughly half a million undocumented immigrants married to US citizens in a move ahead of the November presidential election.
“The Statue of Liberty is not some relic of American history. It still stands for who we are,” Biden said at the White House on Tuesday, as he articulated his Democratic Party’s line on immigration – a hot-button issue in the country.
“But I also refuse to believe that for us to continue to be an America that embraces immigration, we have to give up securing our border. They’re false choices,” he said defending the curbs on asylum-seeking at the US-Mexico border announced on June 4.
The move will also pave the way for the children of these immigrants to attain US citizenship. A White House statement said the move will “ensure that US citizens with non-citizen spouses and children can keep their families together”.
Here’s more about the new programme announced months ahead of the presidential elections:
What is Biden’s new immigration plan?
- Under the sweeping new immigration plan, undocumented spouses of US citizens who have been living in the US can request lawful permanent residence while staying in the country.
- However, the requests will not all be approved and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will consider these requests on a case-by-case basis.
- To be eligible, the spouses have to be married and living in the US for at least 10 years as of June 17, 2024, and “not pose a threat to public safety or national security”, according to a DHS fact sheet.
- The processing of permanent residence applications can take months to years. Those granted permanent residency, called getting a “green card” in the US, can apply for US citizenship.
- Before this plan was introduced, spouses living in the US without documents would have to travel to their home country and apply for citizenship at a consulate – a process that could take anywhere from three to 10 years.
- “They [undocumented spouses of US citizens] have to leave their families in America with no assurance that they will be allowed back in the United States. So they stay in America, but in the shadows, living in constant fear of deportation without the ability to legally work,” said Biden in a White House speech, explaining why the old system needed a fix.
Migrants are taken into custody by officials at the US-Mexico border on January 3, 2024, in Eagle Pass, Texas, the United States [Eric Gay/AP Photo]
Who will Biden’s immigration plan benefit?
- The DHS fact sheet says that around 500,000 non-citizen spouses of US citizens are eligible for the programme.
- Additionally, around 50,000 children of these spouses are also eligible for this process.
What are Biden’s other recent immigration measures?
- On Tuesday, Biden announced a separate policy that will help Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients, also called “Dreamers”.
- The DACA programme was introduced in 2012 by the administration of former President Barack Obama, when Biden served as vice president, as temporary deportation relief for children who came to the US as undocumented immigrants with their parents.
- Under Biden’s recent programme, companies who employ DACA recipients can apply for a work visa for them, which can pave the way for permanent residency.
- Tuesday’s sweeping measures come two weeks after Biden imposed restrictions on the right to seek asylum at the US-Mexico border, which saw a surge in unauthorised crossings last year. Critics slammed Biden’s asylum restrictions, saying they mirrored the policies of former president Donald Trump, who has pushed for hardline approaches to immigration. Immigrant rights groups have sued Biden over the June 4 border asylum restrictions.
Donald Trump has been criticised for his hardline anti-immigrant policies [File: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters]
How have Republicans reacted to Biden’s immigration programme?
- Donald Trump, Biden’s challenger: “Biden only cares about one thing – power – and that’s why he is giving mass amnesty and citizenship to hundreds of thousands of illegals who he knows will ultimately vote for him and the Open Border Democrat Party.”
- Mike Johnson, House speaker: Biden is “trying to play both sides and is granting amnesty to hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens,” Johnson said in an X post. “This is proof-positive of the Democrats’ plan to turn illegal aliens into voters”.
- Rick Scott, US senator from Florida: “While families struggle to pay the bills, Biden is sending our deficit through the roof to pay for free housing & food for illegal immigrants,” Scott posted on X.
How important is immigration to the 2024 elections?
- Biden’s recent immigration policies come less than five months before the November 5 election, in which Biden will face Trump.
- According to Pew Research Center surveys conducted in January 2024, around 57 percent of Americans say dealing with immigration should be a top policy goal for the president and Congress this year.
- This has increased by 18 points since Biden’s term began due to growing concern among Republicans.
- A little over half of US voters support deporting all or most undocumented immigrants in the US, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling.
- On the other hand, a poll published in April 2024 by the advocacy group Immigration Hub concluded that 71 percent of voters in seven election battleground states supported allowing spouses who have lived in the US without documents for over five years to remain.
Trump allies push bill to bar non-citizen voting, even though it’s already illegal
This article is more than 1 month old
Hyping conspiracy theory that Democrats are bringing people into US to vote for Biden, extremists try to tie immigration to elections
Dozens of Donald Trump’s allies and election denialists, including extremists like lawyer Cleta Mitchell and ex-adviser Stephen Miller, are promoting a bill to bar non-citizens from voting in federal elections, even though it’s already illegal and evidence that non-citizens have voted in federal races is almost nil.
The push for the bill is seen as further evidence of extremist tactics used by ex-president Trump and his Maga movement to rev up his base of supporters for the 2024 election with outlandish claims designed to scaremonger over election fraud and far-right rhetoric detached from reality.
It also fits a pattern, that many Trump allies appear to be laying the groundwork for false complaints of election fraud should Trump suffer electoral defeat again in 2024 – raising fears that the US could see a civic crisis similar to what followed the 2020 contest when his allies attacked the Capitol in Washington DC.
The legislation’s rationale, which Trump touted at a Mar-a-Lago event with the House speaker, Mike Johnson, last month, has drawn sharp criticism from voting experts and even some Republicans.
At the bill’s formal unveiling on 8 May, Johnson was joined by Mitchell, Miller and leaders of rightwing groups such as the Tea Party Patriots and the Arizona Freedom Caucus, who have formed the Only Citizens Vote Coalition, which boasts some 70 members pushing the measure.
Johnson hyped the Save act – or Safeguard American Voter Eligibility act – framing illegal citizen voting as a more serious threat than Trump’s false charges that Joe Biden won the presidency in 2020 due to voting fraud.
Johnson – whose 8 May press conference drew the bill’s lead sponsors, the senator Mike Lee of Utah and the representative Chip Roy of Texas – allowed that “we all know, intuitively, that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections. But it’s not been something that is easily provable.”
A lawyer and key Trump ally, Johnson was a central player in Trump’s baseless drive to overturn his 2020 defeat. Johnson led an amicus brief that more than 100 House GOP members signed backing a Texas lawsuit that tried to block the results in four key states that Biden won.
“Even if you weren’t concerned about the drop boxes and the ballot harvesting and the mail-in ballots in 2020,” Johnson said on 8 May, referring to some of the phoney fraud claims Trump and his allies made about Biden’s win, “you definitely should be concerned that illegal aliens might be voting in 2024.”
Actually, studies have shown that non-citizens are extremely unlikely to vote in federal elections, and that the minuscule number who attempt to vote have no impact on the outcome.
One Brennan Center for Justice study that focused on the 2016 election revealed that just 0.0001% of votes across 42 jurisdictions, with a total of 23.5m votes, were suspected to include non-citizens voting, or 30 incidents altogether.
A more recent Arizona study showed that less than 1% of non-citizens try to register to vote, but the large majority of those are believed to be errors, as the Washington Post initially reported.
“These lies about widespread non-citizens voting fuel xenophobic fears and unwarranted doubts about the integrity of our elections. They appear intended to lay the groundwork to baselessly challenge any election results. Americans should be confident that our elections are safe and secure,” said Andrew Garber, an elections counsel at the Brennan Center.
Even some Republican stalwarts say the bill is aimed at spurring more votes for Trump and his allies in Congress by raising the specter of a phoney election-fraud issue.
“This is all political,” the veteran Republican consultant Charlie Black said. “The people who are promoting it know it is already illegal. But they hope by promoting the issue to convince voters that illegal immigrants are voting.”
Other Republicans concur. “This is a messaging bill,” said former representative Charlie Dent, who noted it was “already illegal” for non-citizens to vote. “They’re trying to tie this to the border issue. It’s completely campaign-driven by challenging Democrats to vote against it.”
Critics warn that the Save Act, which is seen as unlikely to pass the Senate if the House approves the bill, would make it harder to register people to vote since it would require citizenship proof such as a birth certificate or passport, which many Americans lack.
Federal law now just requires voters to fill out a form swearing they are a US citizen.
Little wonder that the legislation is fueling hefty support from many well-funded, Trump-allied election-denialist groups and their leaders.
Rightwing lawyer Mitchell, who runs the election-integrity network at the Conservative Partnership Institute where she is a senior legal fellow, has been in the vanguard of promoting conspiracies about non-citizen voting.
Mitchell raised the specter of non-citizen voting in February on a conservative Illinois talk radio show where she said: “I absolutely believe this is intentional, and one of the reasons the Biden administration is allowing all these illegals to flood the country. They’re taking them into counties across the country, so that they can get those people registered, they can vote them.”
A little-known group that Mitchell quietly set up last year, dubbed the Fair Elections Fund, which she is president of, is listed as a member of the Only Citizens Vote Coalition.
A longtime election conspiracist, Mitchell was on Trump’s call with the Georgia secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, on 2 January 2021 when Trump exhorted him to “find” 11,780 votes to overturn Biden’s win there.
Similarly, Stephen Miller, who runs the rightwing litigation outfit America First Legal and served as Trump’s hardine immigration adviser, has been working zealously to promote fears of illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Democracy in America is under attack,” Miller said at the 8 May press event. Miller decried the “wide-open border and obstruction of any effort to verify the citizenship of who votes in our elections”.
Notwithstanding the dearth of evidence that non-citizen voting is a real threat, Miller has repeated bogus conspiracy theories that Democrats are bringing voters into the US to boost Biden winning in November.
The Maga world’s obsession with non-citizen voting was palpable at a Las Vegas event last month hosted by the former Arizona sheriff Richard Mack, who leads the far-right Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, which drew a number of sheriffs and other elected officials from several states. Mack, an ex-board member of the extremist Oath Keepers, said in April that “election fraud and the border go hand in hand”, a claim that lacks any evidence.
Voting experts are alarmed at the growing efforts of Trump allies to highlight a virtually nonexistent threat and promote legislation that would require voters to show documents to register that millions of Americans do not have.
“Millions of eligible American citizens lack easy access to a passport or birth certificate, so requiring eligible voters to show either one to register to vote would impose a significant hurdle with no real benefits for election security,” said Garber of the Brennan Center.
Other voting specialists voice similar concerns.
“Instead of taking meaningful action to strengthen our critical election infrastructure, Speaker Johnson is adding fuel to the fire by linking immigration policy to election security,” said Carah Ong Whaley, director of election protection at Issue One, a bipartisan political reform group.
Instead, Whaley urged Johnson and his allies to work in a bipartisan way “to increase federal funding to ensure that officials have the resources they need to guard against growing foreign interference concerns and cybersecurity threats”.
Republican figures also express strong misgivings about what is driving the bill’s backers.
“Since Trump has surrounded himself with the losing general election narrative about fraud in 2020, he needs to change the narrative,” said Republican consultant Chuck Coughlin. “These types of proposals pushed by his allies are critical to him duping American voters to vote for him again.”
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Republicans slam Biden immigration order as election ploy
Republicans are accusing President Biden of trying to influence the 2024 election with his move to allow undocumented spouses and children of U.S. citizens an easier path to seek permanent residency, with some using a dubious claim that it would create more Democratic voters before November.
Former President Trump, who said he would reverse the Biden order if elected, said that Biden was just “using” the migrants.
“But he’s going to let everybody come in, because you know what they’re trying to do, they’re trying to sign these people up and register them,” Trump said during a rally in Wisconsin on Tuesday afternoon.
The cynical response to the relief action announced Tuesday, which would apply to an estimated 550,000 individuals, has plenty of inaccuracies.
The order streamlines paths to regularize their migratory status, including through work visa applications, and eliminates the need for certain migrants to leave the country to apply for permanent residency from abroad — a process subject to years-long waiting periods.
But it does not create an influx of hundreds of thousands of new citizens and would certainly not add to the rolls of eligible voters before the 2024 election.
Still, the fear of an influx of Democratic voters now or in the future is a core part of the GOP resistance to the Biden action.
Trump campaign national press secretary Karoline Leavitt similarly said in a statement earlier in the day that Biden was “giving mass amnesty and citizenship to hundreds of thousands of illegals who he knows will ultimately vote for him and the Open Border Democrat Party.”
“That’s their game plan. Get as many registered to vote as they can,” said Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.). “They don’t care about citizens, they don’t care about these people. They’re just looking for voters, and they’re trying [to] do as much as they can before the next election because they’re seeing the writing on the wall.”
In response to Tuberville’s comment, one House Democrat made a quip about the famously slow speed of the federal immigration bureaucracy.
“If only USCIS worked this fast,” said Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), referring to United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that processes immigration applications.
For Republicans on Capitol Hill who had rejected a Biden-backed border compromise plan earlier this year, the order also serves as validation of their distrust of him on border and immigration policy.
Biden earlier this month implemented another executive action intended to crack down on border crossings, turning away migrants seeking asylum on the border during days with a high number of daily encounters. Republicans had largely rejected a similar measure in a failed border bill compromise earlier this year.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Biden is trying to “trying to play both sides” with the pair of executive actions.
“The President may think our homeland security is some kind of game that he can try to use for political points, but Americans know this amnesty plan will only incentivize more illegal immigration and endanger Americans,” Johnson said in a statement.
Johnson, too, said Biden’s action “is proof-positive of the Democrats’ plan to turn illegal aliens into voters,” and that he expects it to be challenged in court and struck down.
In an event announcing the new measure and marking the 12th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program Tuesday, Biden said that the relief action was not a political move.
“Folks, I’m not interested in playing politics on the border or immigration. I’m interested in fixing it. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again today, I will work with anyone to solve these problems. That’s my responsibility as president. That’s our responsibility as Americans,” Biden said.
And the White House has stressed that those eligible for the relief action are limited to a certain group.
“The eligible population is limited,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said of Biden’s relief action in a press briefing Tuesday.
“Individuals who arrive now are not eligible — so we did try to give this a scope, if you will,” Jean-Pierre said.
Though Republicans widely portrayed the Biden order as a political calculation, some made a distinction between exactly what kind of voters would be affected by it in the upcoming election. Rep. Josh Brecheen (R-Okla.) said in a post on the social platform X that Biden’s action was “an effort to appease their family members hoping to garnish their votes for the upcoming election.”
The direct beneficiaries of Biden’s new plan will all be unable to vote in the 2024 election, though their U.S. citizen spouses will.
Even in a best-case scenario, voting in the 2028 presidential election would be a long shot for undocumented beneficiaries who begin their permanent residency application immediately under the new policy.
It takes spouses of U.S. citizens at least 10 months to receive their green card, and then they must wait three years — and remain married — to be eligible to apply for naturalization, a process that takes on average eight months from the time of application.
Accounting for a 90-day early naturalization allowance, that means the quickest a beneficiary would become a U.S. citizen is about 50 months — and the 2028 election is 52 months and 20 days away.
One Republican who has advocated for immigration reform avoided the misleading claims of new voters when responding to Biden’s order — but nonetheless assessed that it was a political move.
“President Biden’s latest Executive Order on immigration is a blatantly political move, of questionable constitutionality, in an election year,” Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart (R-Fla.) said in a statement.
“These Executive Orders are counterproductive and will do nothing to alleviate the ongoing chaos at our southern border. [Department of Homeland Security] personnel are overwhelmed, and Border Patrol agents can barely keep up with the influx of people, including dangerous individuals, crossing into our country.”
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) argued that the Biden order contributes to policies that incentivize illegal migration.
“People realize that if you make it here, President Biden’s going to let you stay, and you’ll be able to get on a pathway to citizenship,” Cornyn said. “That’s been a huge magnet, and it’s going to attract even more people.”
HOW “UNDOCUMENTED” WORKERS ARE BECOMING ENTITLED TO SOCIAL SECURITY
Q: How can illegal immigrants get Social Security? They don’t pay taxes!
A: That’s a common misconception. According to estimates from the Social Security Administration’s Chief Actuary, three-quarters of “other-than-legal” immigrants have payroll taxes withheld.
Q: How can payroll taxes be withheld if illegals don’t have a Social Security number?
A: Immigration law forbids working in this country without legal authorization and a Social Security Number (SSN). Yet millions of “undocumented” immigrant workers are earning income. Illegals often get jobs by using illegally obtained, forged, or invalid Social Security numbers. Employers in turn withhold payroll taxes and report the earnings to the Social Security Administration (SSA) using those numbers. When the numbers don’t match up with the numbers issued by SSA, they go into a special file called the “Earnings Suspense File.” Valid numbers issued from the U.S. government are also misused.
Q: What numbers are those?
A: Federal law requires noncitizens who earn income in the U.S. to file tax returns. In order for a person who isn’t eligible for an SSN to do this, the Internal Revenue Service provides an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) to facilitate the filing of tax returns. The number looks very similar to an SSN, having nine digits. Although that number does not authorize the number holder to work, undocumented workers use them to get jobs. More than 7.8 million ITINs were issued between 2005 and 2010. The Social Security Administration (SSA) itself is another major source of abused numbers. Between 1974 and 2003 the SSA issued 7 million “non-work” SSNs. The cards are clearly printed NOT VALID FOR EMPLOYMENT and they do not authorize noncitizen number holders to work. Audits by the Social Security Inspector General have found these numbers are widely misused by illegal workers.
Q: How do they claim benefits if the law prohibits illegals from collecting?
A: There are several ways it happens. One has to do with the type of SSN that was used for employment. The 2004 law requires work authorization in order to claim Social Security. But the law pertains only to individuals who received their SSN after January 1, 2004. If the individual was issued an SSN prior to January 1, 2004, like the 7 million non-work SSNs issued prior to 2003, the 2004 law prohibiting payment of Social Security does not apply. According to the Congressional Research Service and the Government Accountability Office, that group does not need to have ever received legal work authorization in order to claim benefits — they may have worked illegally their entire careers.
As long as all other qualifications are met, and they have evidence of their earnings, like W2s, they may file a claim for Social Security benefits. Others who receive an SSN after 2004 must have work authorization to claim benefits. Yet even people who worked illegally for many years sometimes later change status. That can occur even without an amnesty, especially if the illegals have children who were born in this country. Because the children are born as U.S. citizens, when they become adults they can sponsor their parents to stay in the U.S. legally and to receive work authorization. If their parents kept W2s and evidence earnings, those work credits will be re-instated to their new SSNs. Once they receive work authorization, noncitizens can later file a claim for Social Security benefits.
Currently the SSA uses all earnings to determine entitlement to benefits, including the earnings for jobs worked illegally. The majority of seniors responding to TSCL surveys on the topic believe that noncitizens should not be allowed to receive Social Security based on illegal work. TSCL agrees. Social Security benefits are determined on earnings and work history, regardless of whether taxes were paid or not. Because those earnings are held by Social Security in an Earnings Suspense file, non-citizens could at some point gain access to benefits based on illegal earnings. TSCL strongly supports legislation that would ban the payment of Social Security based on unauthorized work.
Lara Logan: They’re Giving Social Security Numbers to Illegal Aliens at the US Border
Investigative journalist Lara Logan spoke Saturday in Arizona on a voter integrity panel.
During her speech, Logan told the audience the Biden regime is handing out social security numbers to illegal aliens at the southern border.
Over 3 million illegals will have crossed into the United States via the open southern border in Joe Biden’s first two years in office.
This needs to be Joe Biden’s first impeachment trial — the purposeful destruction of the United States of America.
Lara Logan: You look around you and you know they don’t actually believe in citizenship. And now when people come across the border illegally, I have this confirmed from border patrol agents who are actually, physically doing this, they get given a Social Security number. They get assigned a Social Security number when they cross. I’m not sure how many of you are aware of that. And if you really want to know where the cheating starts, it’s long before you get to the polls. Think about it, it starts with the census. It starts with counting illegals in the census.
We also know the Biden regime is tossing backlogged immigration cases for tens of thousands of illegals.
Lara Logan says illegal migrants are already getting Social Security numbers, US is giving them out at the border
While attending an election security forum in Arizona Saturday, investigative journalist Lara Logan leveled a massive allegation against the federal government regarding illegal immigrants and Social Security.
On Saturday in Tempe, Arizona for America First and We the People AZ Alliance hosted the Arizona Election Security Forum with The America Project. With panelists that included state senators, state representatives and Republican gubernatorial hopeful Kari Lake, Logan took her opportunity to speak to assert sources within U.S. Customs and Border Protection have been assigning Social Security numbers to border crossers entering the country illegally.
“You know you have to remember they don’t actually believe in citizenship,” Logan stated of open border proponents. “And now when people come across the border illegally — I have this confirmed from border patrol agents who are actually, physically doing this — they get given a Social Security number. They get assigned a Social Security number when they cross. I’m not sure how many of you are aware of that”
The panelists appeared visibly shocked at the journalist’s assertion which she continued suggesting was part of a larger scheme to influence the delegate counts in states like California.
“And if you really want to know where the cheating starts, it’s long before you get to the polls, right? I mean, think about it, it starts with the census. It starts with counting illegal immigrants in the census,” she said.
Logan’s allegations followed earlier reporting of President Joe Biden’s administration seeking to use Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to issue government IDs to illegals deemed “provisionally released noncitizens.”
Rep. Lance Gooden (R-TX) issued a letter to ICE Acting Director Tae Johnson Thursday where he stated, “Unless this program has rigorous guardrails to ensure adequate vetting, credentialing, and collection of biometrics, Secure Docket Cards will do nothing to secure our border, and the American people should be very concerned our entire national security framework is in jeopardy.”
Texas lawmaker demands ICE scrap ‘dangerous’ plan to give illegal aliens id cards https://t.co/JVWs4EgWEd
— American Wire News (@americanwire_) July 30, 2022
“When I demanded President Biden stop allowing illegal immigrants to use arrest warrants as ID to fly,” he stated of the situation, “I was hoping he’d stop flying them across the country. Instead, he’s decided to give them government IDs and risk the safety of our communities, the integrity of our elections, and the stability of our social safety net programs.”
He was joined by Republican Reps. John R. Carter (TX), Byron Donalds (FL), Troy Nehls (TX) and Thomas P. Tiffany (WI) on the letter. An additional letter was sent to Johnson Friday signed by 16 Republicans that further alleged “the issuance of ID cards raises the possibility that illegal aliens will use these identification cards to improperly access benefits such as housing, healthcare, and transportation.”
The concerns of potential outcomes posed by Republican members of Congress were in line with the conclusions drawn from Logan’s reported investigation. However, they did not go as far as to suggest this was already taking place.
The journalist went on to contend, “There’s one thing that I’ve learned as I’ve been investigating this…they love euphemisms because it’s all about democracy and if there’s any form of voter security, that’s voter suppression and racism and white supremacy.”
“And if it’s the other side, you know, anything we can do to get more people out to vote. But, actually, when you talk to the canvassers they’ll tell you that when they go into the low income areas…that’s where they find the most fraud,” she concluded.
Why Does the Media Continue to Mislead Americans About the Border?
There’s a catastrophic crisis underway at our southwest border, a crisis that’s been raging since Joe Biden first took office and undid the Trump-era border security policies that I helped craft and implement.
That crisis has been readily apparent to anyone willing to take off the political blinders and just look at what’s happening.
Sadly, though, most of the political establishment in Washington, the coastal elites in their gated communities, and the open-borders bureaucracy have shown they are unwilling to do just that.
And that includes most of the U.S. corporate media.
Some journalists have done exemplary work covering the border crisis for months—Bill Melugin and Griff Jenkins of Fox News, Townhall’s Julio Rosas, Jennie Taer of the Daily Caller, NewsNation’s Ali Bradley, and Newsmax’s Jaeson Jones all come to mind.
For the most part, however, the media has not only largely ignored the border crisis, but has actively participated in the left’s campaign to mislead and deceive Americans about the scope, scale, and causes of the crisis.
I experienced that deception firsthand last week.
The Heritage Foundation, where I serve as a visiting fellow, was contacted by two reporters from the Arizona Republic—Rafael Carranza and Daniel Gonzalez—who wanted to speak with someone about the number of illegal aliens who have entered the United States since Joe Biden took office.
The question has major public policy ramifications, particularly for Arizonans, who are seeing the crisis literally play out on their doorsteps.
I happily agreed to the interview, and despite encountering everything from skepticism to fierce resistance to the case I made, I laid out in great detail the facts about who has entered this country under Joe Biden.
In the end, the Arizona Republic published a piece that actively misleads its readers. Carranza, whose name appeared on the byline, first failed to accurately report the number of individuals who have improperly entered the country, under-counting the right number by more than half a million.
Even more egregiously, he failed to make any mention of the massive number of “got-aways” who have illegally crossed into our country and never been apprehended by Border Patrol.
Known got-aways, or those who Border Patrol knows come across the border because they’re caught on cameras, sensors, or even seen by agents, have totaled more than one million since Joe Biden assumed office. And that number continues to grow as more and more agents are pulled off the frontline security mission to process and release historic numbers of illegal aliens being detained.
Border Patrol also knows that every month, a certain number of illegal aliens slip across the border and are never even tracked. As someone who used to oversee the Border Patrol, I can tell you this number can be up to twice as many as the known got-aways. That’s another 1-2 million unknown got-aways under Biden, easily.
Carranza included none of these figures, nor others I gave that added even more to the overall total.
In doing so, he reported a conclusion about the number of improper border crossings that was inaccurate and misleading.
The rest of the piece was a further attempt to downplay the crisis, or make excuses for why it’s occurring.
He even went so far as to blame historic levels of apprehensions on repeat offenders (recidivists). The problem is that recidivism has always been tracked by CBP, not just the past 18 months. More importantly, whether it’s a first-time offender or someone crossing for the tenth time, that individual demands Border Patrol time and resources, and pulls more attention away from actual border security. The effect is the same.
And we know the cartels are taking advantage of fewer agents on the line. We see the consequences in increasing numbers of got-aways and deadly narcotics flowing across the border.
One has to ask to all this dishonesty: Why? What agenda was he advancing that is more important than the truth? Why are so many in corporate media not only ignoring the crisis, but actively trying to deceive Americans when they do cover it? How did this piece make it past an editor?
Incidents like this demonstrate why trust in corporate media is at all-time lows. Instead of reporting the facts and letting Americans make up their own minds, they withhold vital information that would provide more context and clarity. They withhold the truth.
And it’s the case across corporate media. Most of the time, these outlets are content to simply ignore the crisis, pretending it doesn’t exist. But when they weigh in, they either miss the truth or mislead.
A recent Los Angeles Times op-ed asserted, “There is no question that there is a crisis at the border…But it is a humanitarian crisis exacerbated by political posturing, not one caused by an uncontrolled border.” A columnist for the Arizona Daily Star wrote about the “five ways you can tell today’s border panic is trumped up.” And without any irony, apparently, a CNN “fact check” posited in August 2021, “While migrants continue to arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border in record numbers, it’s false to claim that the border is ‘open’…”
Reporters may disagree with the vast majority of Americans who support secure borders and enforcing the law, but they’re not entitled to their own facts.
Thankfully, Americans are entitled to increasingly tune them out.
Fact check: Why will U.S. start giving ID cards to immigrants at border?
Conservative commentator Tomi Lahren tweeted that President Joe Biden “wants to give illegals ID cards so they can start collecting American benefits.” PolitiFact checks her claim.
Reports of a new proposal from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to provide an identification card for certain immigrants entering the U.S. illegally has prompted criticism from Republican lawmakers and social media users.
President Joe Biden “wants to give illegals ID cards so they can start collecting American benefits,” conservative commentator Tomi Lahren said July 25 on Twitter. “Boy, I wonder if that could possibly lead to voter fraud.”
Her comment was reshared in a Facebook post that was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)
We looked into the proposed ID cards and found no evidence that these are intended for immigrants to access benefits or that they could lead to voter fraud.
Biden wants to give illegals ID cards so they can start collecting American benefits. Boy, I wonder if that could possibly lead to voter fraud…— Tomi Lahren (@TomiLahren) July 25, 2022
Lahren’s team did not respond to PolitiFact’s request for comment.
ICE proposes new ID cards for some immigrants in the U.S. illegally
A pilot program being developed by ICE would provide Secure Docket Cards as forms of ID to some immigrants entering the U.S. illegally after undergoing a national security background check, according to an ICE spokesperson.
Immigrants seeking asylum or apprehended at U.S. borders are detained or released into the U.S. while they await for their cases to be processed. The Department of Homeland Security provides them with a notice to appear, a charging document that explains why the U.S. government seeks to deport them.
This notice and other documents are provided on paper, which can be easily lost and is susceptible to damage, according to a statement from ICE. The card would give DHS and recipients access immigration information digitally.
A July 1 report from the House Appropriations Committee said $10 million had been allocated for the Secure Docket program, aiming to make DHS more efficient.
Will the ID cards provide benefits to immigrants?
Although the program’s specifics are under development, according to an ICE statement, there is no evidence that the Secure Docket Card is being created to allow immigrants in the U.S. illegally to access benefits.
Immigrants in the U.S. illegally are ineligible for almost all federal benefits, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures and the National Immigration Forum.
Immigrants might be eligible for certain benefits, such as some health care and nutrition programs, if those benefits are deemed necessary to protect life or guarantee safety in dire situations.
Only U.S. citizens can vote in federal elections
Immigrants who are illegally in the U.S. cannot vote in federal elections. Under federal law, U.S. citizenship is required to participate in a national election. States can check databases to verify a voter’s citizenship status.
Anyone who violates this law can be deported, fined or incarcerated.
The number of cases of noncitizens voting in federal elections is “minuscule,” Rutgers University professor Lorraine Minnite previously told PolitiFact. She said, in these cases, noncitizens are accidentally registered to vote when they go to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Sixteen states and the District of Columbia currently provide driver’s licenses to immigrants in the U.S. illegally, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
ICE said the secure card is not an official form of federal identification.
A few municipalities across the nation have allowed noncitizens to vote in local elections, such as for school board members or city council.
PolitiFact ruling
Lahren claimed that “Biden wants to give illegals ID cards so they can start collecting American benefits.”
ICE is developing a Secure Docket Card program, which would grant ID cards to people to track and access information related to their immigration case.
There is no evidence that the cards are being created to provide immigrants with benefits or to facilitate voter fraud.
Under federal laws, immigrants in the U.S. illegally are ineligible for most federal benefits, and only U.S. citizens can vote in national elections. If noncitizens vote fraudulently, they can be fined, incarcerated and deported.
We rate this claim False.
Conclusion
I have included a lot of information on the illegal aliens that have crossed our southern borders. I hope these postingshave helped somewhat. Most media is of course biased. I did most of my searching using Google, however, I could not find anthing about the Social Security Numer issue using Google. I had to go to the Brave browser to find these postings. That alone should cause your “Spidey senses” to start tingling. There has to be a reason that the “Dems” are allowing so many immigrants to cros our border, that is more than just cheap labor. How many MS-13 gang members are productive members of society? The “Dems” know that they can’t stuff the ballot boxes like they did in 2020, because they will be monitored. So somehow they are going to get these aliens vote in the 2024 election. It just stands to reason, because Biden can win by following legal means.
Resources
abcnews.go.com, “Immigration emerges as key 2024 election wedge issue for Trump, vulnerability for Biden: ‘Biden’s on a tightrope with this issue,’ one observer told ABC News.” ByAlexandra Hutzler; politica.com, “GOP sounds alarm on ‘noncitizen voting’ in its 2024 election strategy.” By Associated Press; bipartisanpolicy.org, “Four Things to Know about Noncitizen Voting.” By Feyisayo Oyolola; ballotpedia.org, “Laws permitting noncitizens to vote in the United States.” By Theresa Cardinal Brown; aljazeera.com, “Biden’s new immigration plan: How will it work? Joe Biden’s latest plan, announced ahead of the 2024 election, gives some undocumented migrants a pathway to United States citizenship.” By Al Jazeera Staff; theguardian.com, “Trump allies push bill to bar non-citizen voting, even though it’s already illegal. Hyping conspiracy theory that Democrats are bringing people into US to vote for Biden, extremists try to tie immigration to elections.” By Theo Menon; thehill.com, “Republicans slam Biden immigration order as election ploy.” BY EMILY BROOKS AND RAFAEL BERNAl;
seniorsleague.org, “HOW “UNDOCUMENTED” WORKERS ARE BECOMING ENTITLED TO SOCIAL SECURITY.”; thegatewaypundit.com, “Lara Logan: They’re Giving Social Security Numbers to Illegal Aliens at the US Border.” By Jim Hoft; americanwirenews.com, “Lara Logan says illegal migrants are already getting Social Security numbers, US is giving them out at the border.” By Kevin Haggerty; heritage.org, “Why Does the Media Continue to Mislead Americans About the Border?” By Mark Morgan; wral.com, “Fact check: Why will U.S. start giving ID cards to immigrants at border? Conservative commentator Tomi Lahren tweeted that President Joe Biden “wants to give illegals ID cards so they can start collecting American benefits.” PolitiFact checks her claim.” By Maria Ramirez Uribe;
Voting and Elections
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2024/09/27/how-soros-backed-organizations-leverage-waves-of-new-immigrants-to-sway-elections/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2024/09/10/how-zuckerberg-influenced-the-2020-election/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2024/02/20/will-illegal-aliens-be-allowed-to-vote-in-2024/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2021/03/16/election-reform/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2021/03/16/voter-fraud-in-2020-revisited/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2023/08/02/2020-got-you-crying-think-again-the-1876-election-was-worse/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2021/05/03/voter-reform-my-final-words/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/12/25/navarro-2020-election-report-examined/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2021/01/01/did-brad-parscale-almost-bankrupt-the-trump-2020-election/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2022/12/16/why-the-red-wave-never-happened/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/11/27/dominion-voting-system-exposed/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/11/13/voter-fraud-in-2020-how-will-effect-future-elections/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/10/22/campaign-funding-disparity-between-democrats-and-republicans/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/09/27/voter-fraud-with-mail-in-ballots-fact-or-fiction/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2021/07/20/can-we-win-it-all-back/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/09/26/polls-how-accurate-are-they/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/08/06/voting-in-november/
https://common-sense-in-america.com/2020/06/06/voting-in-america-in-the-era-of-the-pandemic/