Congress is set to return to DC next month for another major spending headache, and the House Freedom Caucus is ready with its hardline demands.
Lawmakers face a Sept. 30 deadline to renew funding for all government agencies or face a government shutdown.
To further complicate matters, the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus, made up of about 50 members, is demanding that any deal to reauthorize spending include a ban on illegal immigrants voting.
They specifically want a piece of conservative legislation, the SAVE Act, attached that would require proof of citizenship to vote in presidential elections.
But inclusion of the bill would spark protests from Democrats, who would never support such legislation.
And since Republicans hold a slim majority and need every member of the GOP (including the Freedom Caucus) to vote in favor of a spending package, a government shutdown would be all but certain.
Congress is set to face another major spending headache in November, and the House Freedom Caucus is ready with its hardline demands.
“The House Freedom Caucus believes House Republicans should return to Washington to continue the work of passing the 12 appropriations bills to cut spending and advance our policy priorities,” the group said in a new policy statement.
‘In addition, the Continuing Resolution should include the SAVE Act, as requested by President Trump, to prevent non-citizens from voting and preserve free and fair elections in light of the millions of illegal immigrants imported by the Biden-Harris administration over the past four years.’
They fear that migrants will vote for Kamala Harris in the upcoming elections, which would give a boost to the Democratic nomination.
As a result, Republicans are pushing the SAVE Act, which aims to force election officials to verify citizenship in elections. This law has already passed the House of Representatives, with the help of only five Democrats, but was destined to fail in the Senate.
The bill would close any loopholes that allow people to register to vote without proof of U.S. citizenship or photo ID, require all 50 states to remove any illegal immigrants from their voter rolls, add penalties of up to five years in prison for election officials who register noncitizens to vote, and require proof of citizenship for those who vote abroad.
Most ballots require some form of proof of identity to register to vote, such as a driver’s license. Not all such proof of identity requires citizenship: the bill would specifically mandate identification requirements such as passports or birth certificates.
Although cases of illegal immigrants voting in elections are extremely rare, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin recently revealed that thousands of people have tried to register in his state, raising fears.
Virginia has found and removed about 6,000 illegal immigrants from its voter rolls between 2022 and 2024, according to the Republican. Last week, he signed an executive order aimed at preventing them from registering to vote.
As has become customary, it seems almost inevitable that Congress will miss the government funding deadline and require a short-term extension of funding to 2024 levels.
The short-term “solution” to keep the government running is called a “continuing resolution” or CR.
The Freedom Caucus supports a CR, believing that a short-term extension could push the funding deadline back until the next term, by which time they expect Donald Trump to be president.
Migrants, mostly from Central America and Venezuela, rest on their way to the United States to escape poverty and violence on the outskirts of Huixtla, Chiapas state, Mexico.
But it is a risky decision. At that point, the House could fall into the hands of the Democrats.
Other mainstream Republicans have insisted that the House move forward with passing 12 separate appropriations bills, one to fund each government agency.
The House of Representatives approved six appropriations bills and scrapped plans to vote on others after running into disagreements over policies.
The Senate has not passed any. Even if both chambers were to pass all 12 bills, they would have to meet and negotiate 12 bills that could get a majority vote in both chambers.