Because of the orchestrated lawlessness of Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Alejandro Mayorkas, and the entire Biden/Harris administration, a wave of illegal immigration is wreaking havoc across our entire country.
With neighbor-states like Colorado opening its doors to illegal aliens, it is utterly foolish to claim that Wyoming is immune from the radical left’s flagrant attack on our laws. Without a verifiable process of proving citizenship at the time of registration, our elections are particularly vulnerable.
Since September 15 is the anniversary of the signing of the US Constitution, this week has been designated nationally as “Only Citizens Vote” week, as a time to highlight the fact that only citizens can vote in elections and to highlight the reforms needed to protect our elections.
With the 2024 General Election approaching and agencies of the Biden Administration seeking to register non-citizens to vote, I took action in 2023 as Wyoming’s Chief Election Officer, proposing a Wyoming-based solution to ensure illegal immigrants would be stopped from being able to register.
In late 2023, my office proposed, and subsequently adopted, rules which would have required documentary proof of Wyoming residency and prevented illegal immigrants from registering to vote in Wyoming.
Other states have these basic election integrity measures but Wyoming does not. These rules received overwhelming support from the public.
Unfortunately, our common-sense election integrity rules were vetoed by Gov. Mark Gordon. I strongly disagreed with the governor’s veto of our rules.
His veto made false excuses that Wyoming state law did not allow the rules and his allies in the media ran with those false arguments as they so often do.
Gordon’s letter was wrong on multiple fronts. Not only does Wyoming State law allow the rules, they are actually required under Wyoming State law.
Wyoming state law expressly defines the registration process as requiring “verification of the name and voter information of a qualified elector.”
The point of this provision in the Election Code is to provide for verification of the information provided on the registration form, which includes an oath that an individual is qualified elector.
In other words, citizenship is one of the pieces of information that would need to be verified under Wyoming state law--but currently that isn’t happening.
Gordon’s letter also made recycled, left-wing arguments that there was no evidence of voter fraud.
He ignored the fact that an illegal alien was found to be on the Wyoming voter rolls just last year. Our office ensured that the illegal alien was removed from the registration list, but this example shows the distinct vulnerability to our elections that our election integrity rule addressed.
We must call Gov. Gordon’s veto for what it is. Gordon’s veto is enabling Biden, Harris and the most radical leftists in America who are trying to help illegal immigrants vote in our elections.
Literally on the same day the governor announced his veto, President Trump and Speaker Johnson were announcing that the House of Representatives would be hearing the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act at the federal level.
The SAVE Act is very similar to our proposed rules requiring proof of residency to vote, and places many of the protections that would have been in place had our rules not been vetoed by Gov. Gordon.
Among other things, the SAVE Act ensures only U.S. Citizens vote in elections for federal office by requiring documentary proof of United States Citizenship at the time of voter registration. In July, the United States House of Representatives passed the SAVE Act, which was cosponsored by Wyoming’s own Congresswoman Harriet Hageman.
Echoing Gov. Gordon, President Joe Biden, for disturbing reasons, has threatened to veto the SAVE Act if it is passed by Congress. For the last two months, the Democrat Senate has refused to take the bill up. In response, conservatives in Congress are doing the right thing and attempting to include the SAVE ACT in a government funding bill.
In light of Gordon’s veto of our proposed rules, it is now more important than ever that government at all levels ensure appropriate safeguards to ensure only U.S. citizens, not illegal aliens, are voting. As Wyoming Secretary of State, I am in complete and total support of the SAVE Act.
Chuck Gray was elected Wyoming Secretary of State in 2022. As Secretary of State, he serves as the Chief Election Officer for the State of Wyoming.
