Proof of citizenship requirements for voting
Should documentary proof of citizenship be required to register to vote in federal elections? Viewpoints from multiple sides.
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Exciting opportunity for students
Before we dive in this week, I want to highlight an exciting event that partner organization Close Up is putting on with Stanford University. Close Up is the nation’s leading nonpartisan, nonprofit civic education organization and is closely aligned to Framechange’s mission of promoting civil discourse.
Do you know a high school student with a special interest in AI, its impacts, and shaping tech policy? Close Up and Stanford’s Deliberative Democracy Lab are hosting the NextGen Roundtable: AI & Democracy Summer Institute on the Stanford campus this July 13-19. It’s an incredible chance to experience Stanford, engage with faculty, and hear a variety of perspectives from peers nationwide. Applications are now open!
Eric
What’s happening
This week, President Trump signed an executive order that aims to require proof of US citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections. Existing rules, under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) (1993), require any individual registering to vote for federal elections (i.e., presidential and congressional races) to attest their US citizenship under penalty of perjury, but they do not require documented proof.
The order: Trump’s order specifically instructs the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) – a small, independent federal agency responsible for improving the administration of elections – to update the federal voter registration form to require that registrants submit documentary proof of US citizenship with the form. Acceptable proof would include a US passport, a REAL ID-compliant driver’s license, or a military ID displaying citizenship. (A birth certificate is not explicitly mentioned.)
While the order would require states to use the new federal form, it is unclear the extent to which states would be pressured to apply the same proof of citizenship standards to state forms (i.e., alternatives to the federal form that enable residents to register for local, state, and federal elections all-in-one).
Other election rules the order calls for include making Election Day the hard deadline by which all ballots would need to be received in order to count (some states allow mail-in ballots to arrive late as long as they are postmarked by Election Day), removing all noncitizens from voter rolls (i.e., lists of registered voters), and discontinuing ballots with QR codes in favor of paper ballots. States that don’t comply with the rule changes could face federal funding restrictions.
Existing state rules: Roughly 8 states have passed legislation that requires proof of citizenship to register to vote in some form, although many of their efforts have been challenged in court. Arizona, for instance, adopted separate citizenship proof rules across its two-ballot system in 2024. Voters who registered for the “full ballot” – covering federal, state, and local elections – were required to provide proof of citizenship. Voters who registered for the “federal only” ballot did not have to provide documentary proof and could only vote in the presidential and Congressional races. A federal court, however, recently ruled Arizona could not reject registrants outright that register for the “full ballot” without proof of citizenship.
Trump’s authority: Many observers contend Trump does not have authority on his own to require proof of citizenship for federal voting registration. The EAC was set up by congressional statute and changes to voter registration requirements would likely require an act of Congress. The order is expected to face legal challenges.
Trump’s order echoes existing congressional legislation called the SAVE Act (2024), which would require proof of citizenship on the federal form. The bill passed the House of Representatives last year with support from 5 Democrats, but is viewed as unlikely to pass the Senate.
While the tangible impact of Trump’s order remains to be seen, it surfaces a longstanding debate over proof of citizenship requirements in voter registration. This week, we take a look at the viewpoints from multiple sides. Let us know what you think.
Notable viewpoints
More opposed to requiring proof of citizenship:
Proof of citizenship requirements would be overly burdensome and reduce voter turnout.
Requiring proof of citizenship for voter registration would limit the ability for potentially millions of Americans to vote. A 2023 study by Brennan Center for Justice found that 21.3M Americans (9% of the population) don’t have ready access to citizenship proof (e.g., due to documents being in a family member’s home or locked in a safety deposit box) and 3.8M people don’t have access to documents at all (e.g., due to them being stolen, lost, or destroyed).
Kansas’ state law requiring proof of citizenship in state-form voter registration, which was eventually halted in court, was found by the state to block roughly 30,000 legitimate citizens from registering to vote.
Proof of citizenship mandates for voter registration would overwhelm state election offices with bureaucratic red tape that are not equipped to verify citizenship and likely increase costs required to implement the necessary systems and personnel.
Proof of citizenship requirements suppress the vote of specific groups.
Requiring proof of citizenship would disproportionately disenfranchise minority voters. A 2023 study by Brennan Center for Justice and University of Maryland found that roughly 11% of respondents identifying as people of color don’t have citizenship documents readily available compared to roughly 8% of respondents identifying as white.
Citizenship proof requirements would suppress the vote of the elderly. A 2006 study by Opinion Research Corporation found that roughly 2.3M elderly citizens (7% of the elderly population) did not have a passport or birth certificate readily available.
Requiring citizenship proof for voter registration would affect low-income citizens more than others. A 2006 study by Opinion Research Corporation found that people making less than $25,000 annually were more than twice as likely to lack adequate citizenship documentation compared to those with higher incomes – an estimated 3M people in this demographic lacked the required documentation.
Rural residents would be disproportionately affected by citizenship proof requirements largely because they live in areas where it is more difficult or inconvenient to obtain proper documentation. A 2006 study by Opinion Research Corporation found that roughly 9% of rural Americans (4.5M people) lacked passports or birth certificates compared to 4.5% of Americans in non-rural areas.
Noncitizen voting and voter fraud are extremely rare.
Existing safeguards and punishments for illegal noncitizen voting make it very uncommon. A 2017 study by Brennan Center for Justice on the 2016 federal elections across 42 jurisdictions found that, among 23.5M votes cast in those jurisdictions, there were an estimated 30 suspected instances (0.0001%) of noncitizen voting, and not all of them were confirmed.
“Imagine you’re an undocumented person living in the United States…Would you risk everything — your freedom, your life in the United States, your ability to be near your family — just to cast a single ballot? Of course you wouldn’t.” (Sean Morales-Doyle, Brennan Center for Justice.)
Voter fraud is extremely rare. From 2000 to 2020, according to conservative think tank Heritage Foundation’s own database, there were 250M votes cast and only 193 criminal convictions for voter fraud of all types. There were only 70 instances of noncitizen voting.
More supportive of requiring proof of citizenship:
Proof of citizenship requirements are popular with American voters.
A majority of Americans, across party lines, support requiring proof of citizenship to vote. A 2024 Gallup poll found that 83% of Americans support requiring proof of citizenship when registering to vote and 84% support citizenship proof requirements when voting.
“Voter ID laws can stop multiple types of fraud, such as impersonating another registered voter, preventing noncitizens from voting, and stopping out-of-state residents or someone registered in multiple jurisdictions. It’s safe to say there is bipartisan consensus for voter ID but a clear partisan divide in the political class. That wasn’t always the case.” (Fred Lucas, Washington Examiner.)
Requiring proof of citizenship is necessary to ensure the integrity of elections.
Requiring proof of citizenship is a common-sense measure to reduce fraud and ensure that only US citizens vote in federal elections, as the law intends. Voters are already required by federal law to be citizens, so requiring ID ensures the law is followed.
Even a small number of illegitimate votes has the effect of diluting legitimate votes, effectively cancelling out one legitimate vote for every illegitimate vote cast and eroding the one-person-one-vote principle.
Citizenship proof would be a valuable step toward improving confidence in US election integrity, with confidence levels in election outcomes fluctuating along partisan lines over the past couple of elections.
Ramping up proof of citizenship requirements would align with democratic norms in other countries. For example, Brazil and India have implemented biometric verification for voting, Canada and Germany require casting paper ballots in person, and Sweden and Denmark only allow mail-in voting for those who cannot vote in person (e.g., those who are abroad, ill, or disabled). (Summarized from White House fact sheet on the executive order.)
A unified, national rule requiring proof of citizenship for voting in federal elections establishes a clear line, ensures consistency across states, and prevents potential “spillover” or confusion among noncitizens that have been permitted to vote in some state and local elections.
Noncitizens have voted illegally in the past.
There have been documented instances of noncitizens being added to voter rolls or casting ballots. For instance, Oregon found that roughly 1,600 noncitizens had been added to its state voter roll due to errant paperwork processing at the DMV between 2021-2024 – which could have enabled those noncitizens to vote – before the state implemented fixes to limit the issue from occurring in the future.
Voting by noncitizens may have swayed past elections. A 2014 study of the 2008 and 2010 federal elections by Old Dominion and George Mason researchers stated a “best guess” that 6.4% of all noncitizens in the US voted in the 2008 election and that this was likely enough to award North Carolina’s electoral votes to Barack Obama rather than John McCain. (Summarized from white paper by Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R – Louisiana).)
Proof of citizenship and voter ID laws do not reduce turnout.
Laws requiring photo ID do not reduce election turnout. A 2019 study by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) found that existing state laws requiring voters to present a valid form of ID in state elections do not meaningfully reduce voter turnout for any group defined by party affiliation, race, or gender.
Snippets
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E Gail, that sounds like the DMV employee should have asked you specifically if you were registered to vote at your new address. It's great that DMV is supposed to ask that question (or maybe you can even register to vote at that time?) but unfortunate that some of their employees don't really care or understand why they are asking the question! I, too, am opposed to efforts to suppress voting. However, I am not convinced that requiring proof of citizenship - or otherwise providing proof that you are who you say you are - necessarily suppresses voting. So many other democratic countries require it. I wonder how it impacts voter turnout and the demographics of that turnout in those countries. In any case, I'm in favor of requiring proof of identification if for no other reason than to end the conspiracy theories about voter fraud that seem to be so prevalent among a certain sector of our population.
I OPPOSE EFFORTS TO SUPPRESS VOTING. I am 65, born in the US, lived here my whole life.
I live in Indiana, which already liberally suppresses voting.
I moved across town (Indianapolis) last July but didn’t get to the BMV till mid October to get my new driver’s license. I made the huge mistake of telling the BMV employee I was registered to vote - which I was at that point but at my old address. I assumed I could vote. Nope.
I was infuriated that I couldn’t vote in November because it takes 30 days. We already have to show our license to vote.
So with my new driver’s license, I could not vote because the addresses didn’t match.
People who care about democracy want people to vote.
People who don’t, try to make it harder.