Democrats brace for defections on non-citizen voting bill
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House Minority Whip Katherine Clark, Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar on May 24, 2023. Photo: Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post via Getty Images.
House Democrats are preparing for a sizable number of defections on a vote to block a Washington, D.C. law allowing non-citizen voting despite their leadership whipping against it.
Why it matters: The bill is likely doomed in the Senate, but Republicans have vowed to turn it into a campaign issue by going after any Democrat who votes against it.
- National Republican Congressional Committee spokesperson Will Reinert said in a press release on Thursday morning that the NRCC is "keeping a close eye" on how Democrats vote.
- Democrats "will pay a heavy price in November for their radical open-border policies," Reinert said.
State of play: The bill, set for a House vote Thursday afternoon, comes as Republicans are increasingly focused on non-citizen voting at the federal level despite little evidence the problem is widespread.
- House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has championed the issue in recent weeks, including by holding a joint press conference with former President Trump.
- House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), for her part, is pushing colleagues to vote against the bill by arguing that it undermine's D.C.'s autonomy.
- "House Republicans are once again attempting to undermine the political self-determination of the nearly 700,000 residents of Washington, D.C.," Clark's office said in a note Democrats over the weekend.
What we're hearing: Senior House Democrats told Axios they expect swing-district Democrats to back the bill, with one predicting it could be as many as the 42 who voted to block D.C. non-citizen voting last year.
- Vulnerable Democrats "don't want the hit that they voted to allow non-citizens to vote," one of the lawmakers said, predicting that "that's what the NRCC hit will be."
- "Basically, the reason Republicans are offering it in the first place [is] to use it to attack Democrats," said another senior House Democrat.
Yes, but: One swing-district Democrat told Axios they will vote against the measure "to honor my belief that D.C. should be a state and has home rule."
- Still, the lawmaker said, "I'm not thrilled with taking this vote."
- Another senior House Democrat said vulnerable members are being "whipped hard" to vote for the bill.
What to watch: The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has adopted a strategy of tying the GOP push against non-citizen voting to Trump's "Stop the Steal" efforts.
- "Vulnerable House Republicans are so afraid of losing, they are now just setting the stage to propel Donald Trump's dangerous election lies," DCCC spokesperson Viet Shelton said in a press release on Thursday.
