By Don C. Reed
In Lake Burundi, Africa. there lives a crocodile whom the locals call Gustave. (1)About twenty feet long and weighing an estimated one ton, it is said to have killed three hundred people. About the only good thing you can say for Gustave is that he is ugly; children are not tempted to play with him.
But what if the monster was lovely, kind-looking, appealing to the eye?
There is a piece of legislation (the “SAVE America Act”) (2) which at first glance appears harmless. But the truth is otherwise.
If the SAVE (Safeguard American Voter Eligibility) Act becomes law, (and President Trump calls it his “№1 Priority”) millions of citizens will find voting more difficult. The Act, by the way, comes in 36 versions, state by state, including one (a Voter ID initiative) in California.
KEY POINT: President Trump is the power behind the SAVE Act; he calls it “the most important bill” he will sign, and says he will not sign any other bills before it. Why? “It will guarantee (victory in) the mid-terms”, he says. (3)
If the SAVE Act wins, Trump says, “Democrats will not (be able to) pass any bills for 50 years.” Look at how the House of Representatives voted for it. With one exception (Henry Cuellar, D-Texas) all Republicans voted for the SAVE Act. You might remember Cuellar, who was pardoned by Trump for bribery.
The Save Act attacks voter rights from many angles: first, by making it hard to register; which sounds simple, but contains a host of tricks and traps. For instance, are you a married woman? If so, before you can vote, you will almost certainly have to change your name. The name on your wedding license must be identical to the one on your birth certificate — or you cannot vote. As eight out of ten women have taken their husband’s name in marriage, this affects roughly 59 million women! (4)
Why does this matter? If women cannot register, they cannot vote. Also, women tend to vote Democrat. Think what it would mean if millions of Democratic votes were denied. It would guarantee victory for Republicans.
Suppose you want to register by mail — most people prefer it — but under the SAVE Act, that would be difficult. You must come to the elections office in person, bringing your photocopied documents. You would lose a day’s pay, plus gas is not cheap.
Don’t forget your birth certificate — do you know where yours is? Or how about a passport? Only about half of Americans have one — and they cost $165 each.
When it comes time to actually vote, you will need a government-issue identity card, like a driver’s license. This is fine, if you own a car — which millions do not.
The SAVE Act will put at risk the vote’s administrators. If they make an honest mistake, they can be sued — or put in jail for five years — or deported.
Is there a need for so much government intrusion? In a word, no. Voting impersonation is an extremely rare crime — easy to see why — would you risk jail or deportation, just for the sake of voting illegally?
How often does it actually happen?
A study of Utah’s “two million registered voters” revealed that only one instance was found of a non-citizen registering to vote…(5)
Even more astonishing, the ultra-conservative “Heritage Foundation…found only 68 (sixty-eight)… non-citizens voted since the 1980s, out of over a billion ballots cast.” (6)
The SAVE Act serves no useful purpose; it would deny the vote to millions —
It is a smiling crocodile.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustave_(crocodile)
2. https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/22/text
3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu59Jr3PzsI&t=13s
5. https://reclaimdemocracy.org/2026-save-act-voter-suppression/
6. Professor Erwin Chemerinsky, School of Law, UC Berkeley, 2026