Lateefah Simon: “Mr. Speaker, this bill doesn't secure elections. It shrinks the electorate. I find it so interesting that in real time…”

“Mr. Speaker, this bill doesn't secure elections. It shrinks the electorate. I find it so interesting that in real time we are having this conversation. When we talk about Black voters, we are going to talk about Black voters. This bill was written so poorly it doesn't even take into consideration women of all races who changed their names when they got married. It is ridiculous. It has been a Federal crime, we know, for noncitizens to vote since 1996. Georgia audited 8.2 million voter registrations and found 20 noncitizens, Mr. Speaker, 20. That is the emergency. That is the emergency that justifies blocking 21 million American citizens who don't have the papers to fill what this bill demands. We all know the history. Darnella Cavaness, my grandmother from Malvern, Arkansas, had to face the poll tax. After Reconstruction, nobody wrote the word 'race' into a single suppression statute. They wrote poll taxes. They wrote literacy tests, good character clauses. It was all race neutral on paper but devastating in practice. The SAVE America Act sits in that tradition. I will say it again. The SAVE America Act sits in that tradition. I have a 14-year-old daughter. I won't stand here and make voting harder for her when she decides to register to vote. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle don't get to shrink the franchise.”