SAVE Act will disenfranchise legal women voters

Published 1:30 am Friday, February 13, 2026

We’re hearing a lot about the SAVE Act — just approved by Republicans in the U.S. House — that it’s “common sense” and “everyone wants this.” Don’t believe it.

The SAVE Act requires documentary proof of citizenship to vote, even though noncitizen voting is already illegal and rare. Here’s what they’re hoping we won’t think about: This affects 69 million American women.

If you changed your name when you got married, your birth certificate won’t match your legal name. You’ll need marriage certificates — maybe multiple — to create a paper trail proving you are who you are.

Who has time for that? Most of us are already holding it all together: household, career, kids, remembering everyone’s everything. The invisible labor alone is a full-time job.

Now add “assemble citizenship paperwork packet” to the list. Not because there’s any actual problem, but because “common sense” tests well.

This isn’t about security. It’s about making voting harder for married women, which feels a little too convenient, doesn’t it?

Women are very good at recognizing when we’re being managed. We know when someone’s making our lives harder while insisting it’s for our own good. We know when bureaucracy becomes a weapon.

When you hear those talking points — and you will, because they’re coordinated — trust what you know. This is a solution in search of a problem.

Call our senators. Five minutes where you’re not managing anyone else’s needs. Five minutes to protect what’s yours. That’s power.

Sarah Blodgett

Snohomish