Grassley Outlines Risks of Voter Fraud, Highlights Need for SAVE America Act

Floor Remarks by Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa Senate President Pro Tempore “Noncitizen Voter Fraud is Real” Thursday, April 16, 2026 VIDEO The SAVE America Act has been a discussion for quite a few days on the floor of the United States Senate, and I would like to give my update on that. I’ve already spoken once on the subject…As I said, I’m a cosponsor of the SAVE America Act . This SAVE America Act ensures only U.S. citizens are registered to vote in federal elections, and it also requires photo ID when voting. Now, that’s pretty simple. It’s so simple that 85% of Americans generally support those principles of voter ID and only citizens voting. And even 71% of the Democrats in polls also support that. Now, what I’ve inserted in the record is what I’ve heard from some Iowa constituents who would say that while election integrity is important, noncitizen voting is not an issue. Now, some of my constituents even accept that noncitizen voting happens, but at the same time, they say it’s not that often. So, we should just ignore it. That’s not how the rule of law works, and we all take an oath to uphold the rule of law. And I’ll bet every one of our constituents says the rule of law is a principle [applied] in America, and it should be fully supported. It’s a fact that nobody’s vote should be diluted by people voting who are not eligible to vote. And voter fraud should not be ignored, no matter the scale. I want to share some recent examples of noncitizens registering to vote and voting in elections. The first one is the state of Montana, a state where elections have been decided by only a handful of votes. Twenty-three potential noncitizens cast nearly 150 ballots in various elections. Then, let’s go to the state of Ohio. In 2024, Ohio found 597 noncitizens registered to vote , 138 of whom voted in recent elections that lacked citizenship status. And then in Texas. Texas removed over 6,500 noncitizens from their voter rolls between the years 2020 and 2024. That’s a larger population than some small Iowa towns have. Then let’s go to New Jersey. In January, two people in New Jersey were charged with illegally voting in 2020 elections. This is in addition to other foreign nationals charged last year for registering to vote and voting in Florida and Massachusetts. My home state of Iowa takes pride in civic participation and election integrity. Even so, in my state, our Secretary of State found 277 noncitizens registered to vote and 35 who actually cast ballots in 2024. Now, maybe you’d say, “This doesn’t really matter, because most people win by thousands, or at least hundreds, of votes.” But I want to give you an example in Iowa where we had a very close election... [W]e know elections can be decided by just a handful of votes. Iowa experienced that first-hand in 2020 when one of our congressional seats was decided by six votes. That’s [Rep. Mariannette] Miller-Meeks, presently a congresswoman from Southeast Iowa. So, we have that election demonstrating how every single vote matters and why only legally-cast ballots ought to be counted. Voting [and] citizen participation [are] the sacred cornerstone of representative government. The SAVE America Act gives Americans absolute confidence that their elected representatives won fair and square, by the people who are legally eligible to vote. -30-