How Only Citizens Vote Coalition and SAVE America ActCoalition Brought Citizenship Verification to Capitol Hill
At the Election Integrity Network, we have known for a longtime that the fight to ensure only citizens vote began with Cleta Mitchell, ourfounder and Chairman. In early 2024, Cleta circulated a pivotal memo warning ofthe vulnerabilities created by the 1993 National Voter Registration Act and therisk that non-citizens could register and vote. That memo was not rhetoric. Itwas a call to action grounded in her decades of experience as an election lawattorney. Later that year, on September 10, 2024, she testified before theHouse Judiciary Committee during the hearing “The Biden-Harris Border Crisis:Noncitizen Voting,” laying out how non-citizens are registering and voting andwhy federal reforms were urgently needed. You can read her written testimony here.
Building on that foundation, EIN helped launch the OnlyCitizens Vote Coalition in early 2024—an alliance of more than 80organizations, leaders, and activists united to stop non-citizen voting. Withpartners including former Trump administration officials Ken Blackwell, EdCorrigan, Linda McMahon, and Mark Meadows, the coalition focused on grassrootsmobilization, state-level voter-roll cleanups, and model legislation. Workingwith groups such as the American Legislative Exchange Council, the coalitionadvanced bills requiring proof of citizenship and posted warning signs atpolling places in high-risk areas. When patriots organize, real change follows.Learn more about the coalition here.
Those efforts bore fruit. The Safeguard American VoterEligibility (SAVE) Act was marked up by the House Administration Committee onMay 23, 2024, introduced by Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) with 49 Republicanco-sponsors. The bill amended the National Voter Registration Act to requiredocumentary proof of U.S. citizenship—such as a passport or birthcertificate—for federal voter registration. On July 10, 2024, it passed theHouse 221-198. EIN and the coalition treated that vote as a major win madepossible by sustained advocacy. The House roll call is available here.
When the Senate did not act, the work continued. The SAVEAct was reintroduced as H.R. 22 on January 3, 2025, and passed the House againon April 10, 2025. To build public pressure, partners at Tea Party PatriotsAction launched the Only Citizens Vote Month Bus Tour on August 18, 2025,beginning in Garden Grove, California. Over three weeks the tour crossed morethan a dozen states, collecting signatures and making the case for the SAVEAct. The tour culminated in a rally at the U.S. Capitol’s Upper Senate Park onSeptember 10, 2025, where thousands of petition signatures were delivered tolawmakers. Speakers included Rep. Chip Roy and Wyoming Secretary of State ChuckGray. Cleta Mitchell and coalition members stood with them. Details on the tourand rally are available here.
In 2026 the legislation grew stronger. Introduced in lateJanuary by Rep. Chip Roy in the House (H.R. 7296) and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) inthe Senate (S. 1383), the SAVE America Act retained the core citizenship-proofrequirement and added robust voter-ID mandates for in-person and mail-invoting, including photo ID and data-sharing with the Department of HomelandSecurity. The bill passed the House on February 11, 2026, by a 218-213 vote.Rep. Roy publicly thanked Cleta Mitchell and the coalition for their role. Itnow faces the Senate, where the debate continues. Rep. Roy’s statement on theHouse passage is available here.
We are grateful that RealClearPolitics and writer CarolinaLumetta recently published “The Mother of the SAVE Act,” which recognizesCleta’s central role in conceiving and advancing this legislation. It was longoverdue. You can read the full article here: https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2026/09/18/the_mother_of_the_save_act_154513.html
The path from Cleta’s March 2024 memo to the SAVE AmericaAct on the House floor is the story of citizen experts, state coalitions, and anational network that refused to let the issue disappear. EIN remains committedto finishing the work—state by state and in Congress—until only citizens votein American elections. Cleta’s March 2024 memo is available here.
