House Bill 2492 and Today’s Voters: The 2024 Election's Test of Integrity and Inclusion
In 2022, the House Bill 2492 established in Arizona guides any state officers to verify if the voter is registered as a U.S. citizen. If the officials are unable to confirm the voter’s citizenship, the voter who is attempting to register the federal form must show proof of their US citizenship in order to fill out the federal voting form, furthermore preventing the applicant from voting federally. According to the constitution, if you did not hold U.S. citizenship while being established in America, you are not eligible to vote.
This bill was initially designed to protect the voting rights of eligible voters. As in 2004, Arizona voters passed Proposition 200, which required applicants to prove their citizenship when they register to vote. But due to the prolonged court decisions and consent decrees that occurred over two decades, this has eroded the strength of the state’s power to ensure that the voters that are registering to vote are actually eligible voters. As a result of the state’s weakened power, over ten thousand people voted in Arizona’s 2020 election who have not been registered as US citizens. Therefore, House Bill 2492 was created and prevents voting fraud and ensures that the people voting for American leaders are legally allowed to vote. A similar law was passed in Texas as in September of 2021, Governor Greg Abbott signed Senate 1 in law which would prevent any voting fraud and uphold the integrity of elections in Texas by preventing voters with no U.S. citizenship from voting. He also claims that this law would “ensure trust and confidence in our election systems—and most importantly, it makes it easier to vote and harder to cheat”. Over three years later in 2024, Senate 1 proved to have worked as an effective law as it was announced that over 450,000 deceased voters were removed from the voter rolls. Both laws, which are similarly structured to prevent voting fraud, work to remove any ineligible voters from federal ballots and uphold voting integrity in America.
But the federal government and a small division of private plaintiffs, which include Democrats and voting-rights groups, disagreed and challenged the House Bill 2492, arguing that this bill conflicts with the federal voter registration rules that were already in place. They further claim that the state cannot impose further extra requirements that supersedes what the federal law already mandates as the federal law named The National Voter Registration Act of 1993 requires voters to swear under penalty of perjury that they are US citizens but doesn’t require them to prove their citizenship. For this reason, on August 22, the supreme court made a divided decision on the House Bill 2492, as the vote totaled 5-4, finishing the ruling which helped reinstate the proof-of-citizenship requirement for the state form only but didn’t enforce the other part of the law which prevented applicants from using a federal form to vote if they failed to prove to possess U.S. citizenship. In other words, House Bill 2492 was unchanged, leaving the requirement of showing any sort of identification to verify your citizenship in the U.S. This court ruling has a negative impact on both underrepresented and underprivileged people as they are excluded from having the ability to vote for America’s federal government leaders. Even though they have a US citizenship, they are still unable to vote due to their lack of identification. For example, a person who cannot afford a home are not only unable to afford an ID but they also lack an address to register onto your ID. Another example are day labors who work long hours as they are unable to find time in the day to visit a place such as the DMV to register and receive a driver’s license in order to have a way to identify themselves as well as a way to prove their US citizenship. Both examples work to prove that although House Bill 2492 upholds the value of voting integrity in America, these small, underrepresented groups are unable to vote due to their unfortunate situation. As a result, they are barred for their federal leaders that run our country even though they are eligible to vote.
While House Bill 2492 ensures the voting integrity by requiring voters to prove they possess a citizenship, it still has a negative impact on a segment of underrepresented people that are unable to get ahold of a form of identification. This exclusion impacts populations that cannot afford the time or money to acquire the required documentation in order for these people to vote. Although the purpose is to prevent voting fraud and uphold the high standards of voting honesty, a system should be created where both security and accessibility should be considered when considering all eligible voters.
