This week I wrote about the Griffin list, which seeks to throw out 65,000+ votes in the North Carolina Supreme Court race (click here and here to read those posts). Meanwhile, the US House of Representatives just passed a bill that could disenfranchise up to half of all US voters, with additional administrative requirements for millions of married or divorced women (and married gay couples as well).

Yesterday, the US House of Representatives passed the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, also known as the SAVE bill. It requires proof of citizenship for people to register for federal elections (or presumably to safeguard your vote in cases like Griffin when sore losers try to throw out votes that were legitimately cast by the rules at that time). Originally that could have been established by a birth certificate, but President Trump supposedly nixed that idea because he is trying to eliminate birthright citizenship (so sad for him that is guaranteed in the US Constitution). So this requirement can be met if you have a Real ID drivers license (supposedly). But the most reliable way to guarantee your vote is to have a US passport.

Unfortunately, only about half of all American voters have a passport.

Passports are expensive. The State Department charges $160 to issue them, plus an additional $60 if they need to be “expedited” (don’t ask me how I know that). Why spend that money if you aren’t planning to travel overseas? Are we really going to force people to spend that much money just to make sure they can vote? What if states start requiring a passport to issue a Real ID drivers license? Plus, I don’t know about other states, but both our local drivers license and passport appointments are booked up for months. So suddenly coming up with proof of citizenship could be expensive and/or inconvenient. The waiting line at our local drivers license office apparently starts around 6:00 AM or earlier.

But for many married or divorced women (and I assume gay couples, although they were not mentioned in any of the news articles I read), it gets even worse.

Spouse’s who have taken the husband’s/other spouse’s last name could also need to provide marriage licenses and other documentation about their name change. According to my US Representative, Deborah Ross, “This legislation would immediately disenfranchise the 69 million women who have changed their names after marriage or divorce.”  It is also another attack on the right of the military overseas to vote, as I assume most do not bring their birth certificates, marriage license, and name change documentation with them on foreign assignments.

Marianne Williamson argues that this added paperwork for married women is deliberate. It is straight out of the Christian Nationalist movement, which provided much of the framework for the infamous Project 2025. The Christian Nationalist movement, which seeks to install Christian biblical principles as the law of the land, argues that the Bible establishes the man as the head of the household. Therefore, they believe there should only be one vote per household–the man’s vote. (Of course, if they could find a way to invalidate ALL votes from a same-sex household, they would. Maybe they are saving that until next year….)

I share this although none of this effects me. I have both a Real ID AND a passport. Most of all, as a woman whose early professional career began in DC during the Women’s Right movement, I didn’t change my name when I got married, as was kind of the norm among my peers. But I want other women who made different choices to be aware of this potential threat to their voting rights.

The prognosis for this bill is questionable. The US House passed this bill last year, but it died in the Senate. Of course, last year the Democrats were the majority. This is a bill that is subject to filibuster. And among their 53 members, several Republican Senators have voiced issues with the legislation.

However, if you don’t have a passport or a Real ID drivers license, maybe it is a good idea to get on the list at the DMV. As I said in my last post, better safe than sorry. A requirement for a Real ID or passport to fly on airplanes WITHIN the US starts May 7, 2025. It may be time to secure your right to travel by air AND to vote by getting some US citizenship ID ASAP.