The GOP’s sweeping new anti-voting bill cleared the U.S. House Wednesday, setting up a high-stakes battle in the Senate.
The House voted 218-213 to pass the SAVE America Act, which experts have said could disenfranchise millions by requiring voters to show documentary proof of citizenship at registration and to provide photo ID when they cast ballots.
Republicans have argued for voter ID broadly, pointing out that there isn’t much to prevent a noncitizen from casting a ballot in a federal election — besides the fact that it’s a felony, easily caught, and would lead to deportation all for the chance to cast one out of hundreds of thousands of votes.
Photo ID makes sense, if the country has this allready in place. In Belgium everyone over the age of 12 has one and it’s all you need to prove identity. And since it has a electronic chip, you can use it to handle quite a lot of official administration through the internet.
This is the United States, so they’re imposing a requirement that somebody not just have a state-issued photo ID, but have a birth certificate or passport which matches their current name. It’s very common for women to change their name when they get married, so the net effect if this passes is to prevent tens of millions of married women from voting.
Republicans want that because women are more likely to vote for Democrats than men.
We got married in the Caribbean, over 30 years ago. We can’t find our marriage certificate. I have no idea where it went, but it has never turned up in several moves.
We have requested a copy several times over the last decade or so, have sent letters with the fee (only about $10), but it is always ignored, or we get a letter back saying that the payment was wrong, or in the wrong currency, etc. We have followed their shifting rules to the letter, we’ve spent over $100 so far, and we still don’t have a copy. As a result, my wife’s driver’s license has expired, and she can’t get a Real ID.
This legislation targets her specifically.
Could you get married again in the states?
In effect, from a documentation standpoint you’re not married. Might be the easiest solution to go to the courthouse and fill out bullshit paperwork to get documentation that you’re married.
We’ve thought of that, but we haven’t pulled that trigger yet. Frankly, this could be the cheapest divorce ever, if we, or one of us, wants to go that route.
Seriously, if we did get officially married in America, what would that mean for the last 30+ years of our marriage? Did we commit numerous cases of fraud by claiming to be married on financial documents, for instance? Mortgages, car loans, income taxes, etc ?
Is getting officially remarried even legal? I know people renew their vows, but that’s ceremonial (and dumb), not legal.
But her maiden name is still valid and presumably matches the one on her birth certificate? There’s no legal requirement to change your name for either marriage or divorce, as far as I know, and latitude is wide in terms of hyphenation, etc. You may have more options than you know.
Also, the question of “fraud” only really matters when bills don’t get paid, and now for voting. If you have other evidence of your marriage (pics, invites, announcements, etc) from that time, you can easily prove that your intent was not fraudulent. I wouldn’t sweat that part of it too much yet.
But if I were in your shoes (and I’m not, so take it with a grain) my next step would be to get a free consult with a family attorney in your state, as they’re the lawyers that deal with name changes the most, and get the real picture of what’s actually legal and possible for you in the state where you live. You could also run the fraud question by him/her, if it’s still an issue.
Great advice, my thanks.
In much of the US, living together and presenting yourself as married over a period of years means you’re actually married.
Yeah, common law marriage isn’t an acceptable form of identification for Real ID.
Those laws have been going away in the 21st century, they’re relics of a time when the government didn’t have great records of things like marriage
I didn’t consider the fraud route. You might need to consult an attorney or consider consulting an attorney in the Caribbean to have them get a copy of your marriage certificate.
This also intentionally targets trans people since getting your birth certificate changed is a pain in the ass and they’ve intentionally targeted our ability to get passports in the current regime.