Letter: A bill in Congress threatens every American’s right to vote

Right now, Congress is considering a bill that could make it much harder for millions of eligible Americans to vote—including you. The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act would require every voter to provide specific citizenship documents, such as a passport or an original birth certificate, not just when registering but also when updating voter registration or, in North Dakota, when voting.

This law isn’t about election security—it’s about creating unnecessary barriers that could prevent countless eligible voters from participating in our democracy. Here’s why it matters:

Military families punished: North Dakota has a strong military presence, and service members often relocate. Under this law, they’d need to provide additional documentation every time they re-register, and a military ID alone wouldn’t be enough to prove citizenship.
Disaster victims disenfranchised: North Dakota has faced 28 federally declared disasters in the last two decades—many of them floods. Families recovering from devastation often lose critical documents. Forcing them to navigate bureaucratic red tape just to vote is unfair and unnecessary.
Women and name changes: Over 160,000 married women in North Dakota likely changed their last name. Across the U.S., an estimated 69 million women do not have citizenship documents that match their current legal name. This law would force them to go through a costly and time-consuming process just to exercise their fundamental right to vote.

Similar laws have been struck down in states like Arizona, Alabama, Kansas and Georgia because they blocked eligible voters from registering. Yet Congress is pushing this flawed policy on the entire nation.

We already have secure systems in place to ensure only eligible voters cast ballots. This bill does nothing to improve election integrity—but it does make it harder for millions of Americans to vote.

Tell Congress to oppose the SAVE Act. Democracy works best when it works for all of us.

Denise A. Dykeman is president of the League of Women Voters of Plum Valley (Minot)