Republicans collide with Trump over no-excuse absentee voting, SAVE Act

President Trump’s push to eliminate voting by mail without excuses such as illness or military duty, a component of the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE America) Act, has put him on a collision course with Republicans from states where absentee voting is widespread and popular.

The SAVE America Act’s core reform would be to require people to show documented proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, when registering to vote. That proposal generally has strong support.

But language to dramatically restrict voting by mail is becoming a sticking point with some Republicans.

Senate Republican sources say that Trump’s last-minute push to strengthen the bill by adding provisions such as eliminating no-excuse absentee voting has “p‑‑‑ed off” some GOP senators to the extent that there may not be enough votes to proceed to the bill on Tuesday.

Sens. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) have already signaled they won’t vote to proceed to the legislation, and GOP aides say there are other senators whose votes are in question, including Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and John Curtis (R-Utah).

Republicans from rural states are concerned that eliminating mail-in balloting for people unless they have strong excuses like serious illness, disability, military duty or travel will hurt GOP-leaning voters in remote areas who then would be forced to travel long distances to vote.

A Republican senator who requested anonymity said Trump’s call to eliminate most absentee voting is “problematic.”

“I think it’s problematic because in some of these states, 60 or 70 percent of people vote by mail. You don’t want to disenfranchise them. Some states have really encouraged it over the years,” the senator said, noting that Republican states such as Montana and Utah have promoted absentee voting.

Trump laid out his demands for the SAVE America Act in a Truth Social post on March 9. Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) says he will offer Trump’s proposed changes to the bill in an amendment.

Aside from concerns about eliminating no-excuse absentee voting for millions of Americans, some Republicans, such as McConnell, are skeptical about legislation that would strengthen the federal government’s role in managing elections, something the Constitution largely leaves to the states.

The senator said McConnell “doesn’t like the bill at all” but “may vote to get on it.”

“I’m expecting him to be a ‘no.’” the lawmaker added.

“Some Republicans are concerned about this, definitely. That provision is getting a lot of blowback in the conference,” said a Republican source familiar with the internal Senate GOP discussion.

The source warned the vote to proceed to the bill “could fail” despite Trump’s strong push to overhaul voting rules before the midterm elections.

“There’s a real question whether the motion to proceed could get 51,” the source added. “With all this new stuff Trump is trying to add in, it’s p‑‑‑ed off Murkowski, Tillis” and others.

Tillis said last week that he plans to vote against proceeding the SAVE America Act, even though he noted he was a co-sponsor of the bill.

“I’m a no because we don’t have a plan. There’s no path for success. I was a no on the talking filibuster path, and this one is going to produce the same result,” he said of the plan to bring the bill to the floor with a simple-majority vote and debate it as long as possible.

Tillis, who represents a state that allows no-excuse voting by mail, also said the legislation’s mail-in ballot provisions need “work.”

“I’m a co-sponsor of the bill, the bill needs work. Like the mail-in ballot [language]. We need to have absentee ballots,” he added. “I’m against just mailing [absentee ballots] to everybody whether they requested something or not. Maybe we need a best-practice for mail-in voting, that’s one example of what I think is flawed policy in the bill.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) doesn’t want to force Democrats to wage a talking filibuster, which would require them to hold the floor with continuous debate, to block the bill.

So that means there’s no clear path to advance the legislation unless Republicans can somehow convince a group of seven to 10 Democrats to vote for the legislation, which is highly unlikely.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) on Monday announced all Democrats will oppose the bill when it comes to the floor Tuesday.

“Not a single Democrat will support the SAVE Act. It is a radical bill. And if Republicans try to burn time on this legislation here on the floor, we will oppose them for as long as it takes,” he declared.

Schumer highlighted the bill’s effort to narrow voting by mail, a possible attempt to pick off Republican support for the measure.

“Now Donald Trump says he does not even want vote-by-mail. Tell that to seniors. Tell that to disabled Americans. Tell that to Americans who live in rural communities far from an election office,” he said on the Senate floor.

One Republican source said Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) has privately raised concerns about eliminating absentee voting because of the impact on voters in large, sparsely populated states.

Republican officials have tried to close the gap with Democrats by promoting vote-by-mail in states such as Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania ahead of this year’s midterm election.

Utah, a GOP stronghold, is one of several states with all-mail elections. Its Republican lieutenant governor, Deidre Henderson, is pushing back against the Trump Department of Justice’s effort to obtain Utah’s complete voter database.

Curtis praised voting by mail last year during a discussion at the Sutherland Institute’s 2025 Congressional Series, which was hosted by the University of Utah’s Hinckley Institute of Politics.

Curtis noted that while voting by mail is controversial on the national level, it’s popular in Utah, adding, “I have just love mail-in ballots” for the convenience they provide for studying candidates and issues with a ballot at the ready, according to a synopsis provided by the Sutherland Institute.

Republican-represented swing states such as Maine, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania allow no-excuse absentee voting, as do a wide swath of GOP states in the Midwest and West, including Iowa, Kansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

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