House Republicans Block DC Law That Would Allow Illegal Residents To Vote

In an important victory for electoral integrity, the House of Representatives voted against a D.C. statute that would have given noncitizens voting rights in municipal elections.

“I applaud the House for acting to ensure that foreign spies and illegal immigrants are not voting in the nation’s capital,” Jason Snead (executive director of Honest Elections Project Action, HEPA) made a statement about the vote. “Thanks to a Constitutional right and since the District is not a state, the House acted as it should have and has moved to stop this extreme and antidemocratic measure.”

The Constitution gives Congress the power to overturn District laws. The GOP-led House voted by 260-173 in favor of overturning the new law. 42 Democrats joined Republicans. The law must be rejected by the Democratic-led Senate, and signed by the President in order to be overturned. While President Biden said that he Opposes the lawHowever, he hasn’t stated whether or not it will be vetoed.

The D.C. Council approved D.C. Bill 24.300 last year, which lowered the qualifications for voting in D.C.’s municipal elections to just one month of residency in the District, discarding the previous U.S. citizenship or legal immigration status requirement. The law takes effect on January 1, 2024.

The Washington Post Estimates The new law would allow noncitizen residents of D.C. to cast their ballots. 21,000 illegal immigrants. Even foreign nationals who pledge allegiance to another country — such as Russian and Chinese diplomats — who’ve resided in the District for just one month would have the power to change the makeup of D.C.’s city council and Board of Education, as well as vote on initiatives, referendums, recalls, and changes to the D.C. charter.  

Although progressives on D.C. Council championed the measure to promote racial equality, the law would actually disenfranchise and dilute the votes of minority residents — born and raised in D.C., and many the descendants of slaves — who are U.S. citizens.

“The D.C. city council is pushing a measure that is wildly out of touch with the views of most Americans and is so extreme that even the Washington Post editorial staff call it ‘radical,’” Snead stated. “Eighty-four percent of Americans agree that only citizens should have the right to vote. But D.C. Democrats want to run our elections like our borders and disregard safeguards that protect the integrity of the vote.”

According to Independent Women’s Forum Visiting Fellow and Civil Rights Attorney Maya NoronhaThe city would have to spend over $3 million to implement the law (changing voter registration applications, voter roll systems and ballot machine system, as well sending out a GOTV mailing to noncitizen residents). Encourageing They can vote), which D.C. doesn’t have.

D.C. is likely to foot the bill. “demand a bailout from the rest of the taxpayers around the country,” Noronha writes. But D.C.’s election system already has significant problems. The Office of

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