Far fewer Ohio women could vote if top election officer gets way | Opinion

The SAVE acronym should stand for Suppress American Votes Everywhere.

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• A proposed bill in the U.S. Senate, the SAVE Act, would require citizens to present a birth certificate or passport to register to vote.
• Richard Topper argues this could prevent thousands of Ohioans from voting, particularly those who move, change their names, or lack access to these documents.

Richard Topper has been a trial attorney in Columbus for 45 years and is actively involved in voting rights efforts.

As chief election officer of our state, Frank LaRose should be focused equally, if not more, on how election laws affect Ohio citizens’ rights to vote as he does to the miniscule numbers of undocumented citizens who attempted to vote in our elections.

To support our right to vote, LaRose, a Republican candidate for Ohio auditor of state, should speak out against the SAVE Act pending before the U.S. Senate.

The SAVE acronym should stand for Suppress American Votes Everywhere.

The bill would require all U.S. citizens to present a birth certificate or passport in person when they register to vote. The act could prevent thousands of Ohio citizens from participating in a single election.

The number far outweighs the 167 noncitizens whom, according to LaRose, “have appeared to cast a ballot in (over 15 elections) since 2018.”

How will the Save Act affect you?

Let’s say you’ve lived and worked in Ohio all your life but decide to move.

To vote, you’d have to re-register in person at your county board of elections and show them your birth certificate or passport. If you have neither, you will be unable to vote. 

For Ohioans who’ve changed their name due to marriage or remarriage, it becomes even more difficult to prove your citizenship with a birth certificate.

This will affect Ohio women’s right to vote, since 70% change their name when they marry.

Every person who wants to vote in Ohio for the first time, who moves to Ohio, or who moves within the state will need to have a birth certificate or passport to vote.

In 2023, close to 1.2 million Ohioans moved within or to Ohio. Under the SAVE Act, every one of those Ohioans is considered a non-citizen until they prove otherwise.

Not everyone has or can get access to a birth certificate.

An argument that sinks

A study by the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement showed over 9% of voting-age citizens, or 21.3 million people in the U.S., cannot timely obtain a birth certificate or passport. In fact, only 37% of Ohioans own a U.S. passport.

The argument that too many non-citizens vote holds no water.

In 2024, Secretary LaRose required poll workers to challenge voters whose driver license read “non-citizen.”

Of the 5,851,387 people who cast ballots in 2024, only five alleged non-citizens attempted, but were not able to vote that day. One in a million. Nationwide, the figures are similar.  

Kansas legislators tried their own SAVE Act. The 67 non-citizens who registered to vote paled in comparison to the 31,000 Kansans who were denied their right to vote.

Ohioans need Frank LaRose to take a stand

More: Ohio AG has received no complaints of foreign election interference

LaRose should focus his attention on what the SAVE Act requires and how this will affect the average Ohioan.

In the past five years in his chief election officer position, LaRose decried costly and non-participatory August elections, then supported an August 2023 election that would have taken Ohioans’ longstanding right to amend our constitution by a majority.

He also voted in favor of unconstitutional gerrymandered Ohio legislative and Congressional districts which diminished the votes of 45% of Ohioans.

Recently, LaRose bowed to the Trump administration and supported an Ohio law which would nullify up to 7,000 legitimate Ohio mail-in ballots received during the four-day grace period after election day.

LaRose can redeem himself by supporting Ohio voters and taking a bold step to speak out against the voter suppressive SAVE Act.

Richard Topper has been a trial attorney in Columbus for 45 years and is actively involved in voting rights efforts.