A vast alliance of mostly left-leaning groups lobbied to oppose the SAVE America Act, Republicans’ signature piece of election-integrity legislation.
Federal lobbying disclosures show that labor unions, LGBTQ advocacy groups, pro-abortion groups, and left-leaning advocacy organizations lobbied against the SAVE America Act during the second quarter of 2026. The legisation stalled in Congress this year.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights organized a coalition letter against the legislation. The letter claims that the SAVE America Act is “not necessary to secure American elections” but instead would “do nothing more than exclude eligible voters” and “make voting harder.”
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, the bill’s sponsor, told the Daily Signal that the groups oppose the bill because “they know that allowing illegal aliens to vote in our elections gives Democrats the best shot at reclaiming power.”
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, suggested that the opposition boils down to an effort to help Democrats win illegitimately.
“Why would a large coalition of leftwing groups, all of which support Democrats and are supported by Democrats—sometimes using your tax dollars—be so worried at the prospect of stopping illegal non-citizen voting in American elections? To ask the question is to answer it,” he told the Daily Signal in a written statement Wednesday.
The White House also criticized the coalition.
“Every American should be asking why the radical Left and Democrats are fighting against the SAVE America Act, which includes commonsense election integrity measures, like Voter ID, that are strongly supported by the vast majority of Americans,” White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis told The Daily Signal. “This legislation would make sure Americans, and Americans only, decide our elections. President Trump has been clear and he is absolutely right: we fix this now, or we lose our country.”
The SAVE America Act would require documentary proof of U.S. citizenship for voter registration in federal elections. Opponents claim the requirements are too onerous and that few noncitizens vote illegally.
Only one of the coalition members the Daily Signal approached for comment responded.
Akilah Watkins, president of Independent Sector, said that her organization opposes the bill because it would “undermine the ability of nonprofits to engage in nonpartisan voter education and voter registration.”
Parker Thayer, an investigative researcher at the Capital Research Center and author of a report on the groups warning about “voter suppression,” countered this narrative.
“The same groups opposing the SAVE America Act whipped up a frenzy over Georgia’s election integrity bill, lost in court, and then voter turnout actually increased across the board,” Thayer told the Daily Signal. He said the groups oppose the SAVE America Act “because commonsense election integrity legislation makes the industrial scale ballot chasing and ‘nonpartisan’ voter registration operations that Democrats rely upon much harder, and more expensive, to operate.”
“When the AFL-CIO, Planned Parenthood, the SPLC, and MoveOn.org all link arms to fight a bill, that tells you everything you need to know about who benefits from the status quo,” Rep. Diana Harshbarger, R-Tenn., told the Daily Signal. “These groups are the radical Left’s political machine.”
Traditional leftist advocacy and election-focused organizations were among the 26 that lobbied against the bill, including the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the American Library Association, Common Cause, the National Council of Jewish Women, MoveOn.org Civic Action, the Young Women’s Christian Association, Democracy 21, the ACLU, and the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Yet lobbying also came from the LGBTQ group Human Rights Campaign, the climate group League of Conservation Voters, the abortion group Planned Parenthood Action Fund, and the seniors’ advocacy group National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, and the Network Lobby for Catholic Social Justice.
The coalition included some of America’s largest labor unions: the AFL-CIO; the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees; the American Federation of Teachers; Communications Workers of America; the National Education Association; and National Nurses United.
Three organizations lobbied for the legislation: the Federation on American Immigration Reform, Heritage Action for America, and the Pressler Persistence.
Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, called the coalition’s opposition revealing.
“Democrats allowed millions of illegal aliens into the country, and now we’ve seen case after case of noncitizens registering to vote and voting in American elections,” Jordan told The Daily Signal. “Everyone knows why these left-wing activist groups don’t support the SAVE America Act and voter ID.”
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[ H/T The Daily Signal ]
