Sen. Jeremy England, R-Vancleave, presents legislation in the Senate Chamber at the Mississippi Capitol in Jackson, Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2023. Lawmakers in both chambers are considering bills that survived their committee deadline. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)
- Democrats say the legislation will make voting harder for some citizens, equating it to “a poll tax by another name.”
A bill aimed at verifying the citizenship of persons registering to vote in Mississippi has been sent to Governor Tate Reeves (R).
State Senator Jeremy England (R), author of the original bill, made the motion to concur with the changes made in the House of Representatives on Monday, sending SB 2588, the “Safeguard Honesty Integrity in Elections for Lasting Democracy” (SHIELD) Act, to the governor’s desk.
According to England, the House’s change will force the use of the national Systematic Alien and Verification Entitlements (SAVE) database to ensure U.S. citizenship when that person is not in the Department of Public Safety’s system or if they have “checked themselves” as a non-resident.
England said the SAVE system is not to be confused with the Trump administration’s SAVE Act which is being considered by the U.S. Congress and would require voters to provide proof of citizenship at the time of registering to vote and mandate that a photo ID be presented when casting a ballot. Mississippi already requires voter ID.
Senator England’s motion to concur came with some push back from Democrat senators, namely State Senator David Blount (D) who submitted an alternate motion to instead invite conference on the bill. Blount said he made that motion because the House language requires annual checks through that federal system, a scenario that makes clearing voter registration errors more difficult.
“I don’t know how much confidence you have in databases created by the federal government but it was created to be the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements database, this is so the federal government could verify aliens and immigrants for entitlements,” Blount described.
The Democrat senator also argued that the bill is being touted as a way to fix a problem that no court in the nation has shown exists.
“The premise of this bill is that there are illegal immigrants and non-citizens voting en-masse in our elections,” Blount explained. “That is not true.”
Blount said he agreed that only United States citizens should be voting in elections while also agreeing with State Senator Daniel Sparks (R) in that mail-in ballots for all citizens without proof of citizenship is not acceptable.
“That’s right, and that’s a bad idea, and I’m not for that,” Blount added.
State Senator Johnny Dupree (D) expressed concern for people like his 90-year-old mother, who relies on mail-in voting to cast her ballots due to health issues.
“So, it seems that we’re going down this dark path of putting obstacles in front of people to keep them from voting, do you agree?” Dupree asked of Blount.
Senator England countered that the bill is not meant to make voting harder for citizens, but to ensure the state’s elections are fair and legal.
“I want to be clear, this isn’t a bill to try to disenfranchise anyone,” England said. “This is a bill to make sure that the registered voters in Mississippi and the people voting in our elections are U.S. citizens.”
Under the bill, the Secretary of State will use the data collected to determine if and how many voters were removed for being on the rolls illegally.
“But if we ever do catch a voter that’s on our rolls that is a not a U.S. citizen and we are able to purge them from the rolls, that’s going to give the people in Mississippi more confidence in our elections, I believe,” said England.
Senator Blount’s motion to invite conference failed in a voice vote, while the House version of the bill passed off the floor by a vote of 31 to 16.
Mississippi Democrats kept up their opposition to the measure on Tuesday, sending out a press release saying the SHIELD Act is “a poll tax by another name.”
“More than 21.3 million Americans lack immediate access to documentary proof of citizenship. More than 140 million Americans do not have a passport. Elderly Americans are among the least likely to have one,” said Mississippi Democratic Party Chairman and State Rep. Cheikh Taylor, using similar talking points to national Democrats opposing the federal SAVE Act currently being debated by Congress. “Republicans aren’t solving a problem, they’re creating one on purpose. There is no voter fraud crisis in Mississippi. There is a participation crisis, and instead of addressing it, they have made it worse. The SHIELD Act is a poll tax dressed up in modern language, and Mississippi Democrats will fight it with everything we have.”
It is widely believed among Capitol sources that Governor Reeves will sign the measure into law.
