McConnell’s big fear on the next budget fight
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Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) arrives at the U.S. Capitol. Photo: by Bonnie Cash/Getty Images
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's office has been working behind the scenes to get House conservatives to drop their demands that a short-term funding bill include an immigrant voting crackdown, Axios has learned.
Why it matters: A GOP showdown is brewing ahead of the Oct. 1 government funding deadline. Conservatives have shown a willingness to flirt with shutdowns to push their priorities, which McConnell's team wants to avoid.
- In a recent meeting with other GOP offices about a short-term spending bill strategy, top McConnell staffers argued that adding a non-citizen voting bill would backfire.
- One fear is such a move would open the door for Democrats to tack on their own voting-related legislation, two GOP aides familiar with the conversation told Axios.
- The John Lewis Voting Rights Act, a Democrat priority that seeks to restore parts of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, was specifically discussed as a possibility.
The big picture: McConnell staffers have urged conservatives in the Senate and the House to keep the precedent of passing clean short-term-funding bills and argued that using a potential shutdown to try to score political points is dangerous before the election, sources said.
- Even if Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) could get a spending bill that includes the immigrant voting crackdown through the House, the measure almost certainly would be dead-on-arrival in the Democrat-controlled Senate and President Biden has said he "strongly opposes" it.
- That reality helps explain the pushback from McConnell's team.
- Their involvement in this latest push shows he's not taking a back seat in high-level negotiations even though he plans to step down as leader after the election.
What to watch: The House Freedom Caucus and other conservatives have been pressuring their leadership to attach legislation that requires people registering to vote to provide a proof of citizenship to any short-term spending measure.
- Johnson is a big supporter of the measure, known as the SAVE Act, and has signaled he's open to attaching it to a funding bill.
- He told reporters Tuesday that he was "looking for every way to push the SAVE Act and to get it through the Senate."
- Noting current government spending expires Sept. 30, Johnson said GOP leaders were "actively discussing the various options."
Zoom in: The SAVE measure, introduced by conservative Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.), passed the House last month with the backing of five vulnerable Democrats.
- Republicans have latched on to the idea of immigrant voting fraud as a top campaign rallying cry, connecting two issues that resonate strongly with their base — illegal immigration at the border and election fraud.
- Last month, former President Trump urged Republicans to "pass the Save Act, or go home and cry yourself to sleep," going on to claim, without evidence, that the "whole voting system is under siege."
Reality check: A handful of states and localities allow non-citizens to vote in some local elections, but it is already a felony for a non-citizen to vote in any federal election.
- Instances of non-citizens wrongfully voting or registering to vote are rare.
- The bill's supporters think requiring documents proving citizenship to register to vote is a simple step to enforce existing laws, while opponents say it could unintentionally lead to the disenfranchisement of some citizens who are eligible to vote.
