@Phil The SAVE act would require a passport, birth certificate, or naturalization certificate, plus another photo ID. Given that politicians (of any stripe) have incentives to manage the distribution of the franchise, creating barriers to obtaining a passport that disproportionately affect those likely not to vote your way becomes incentivized. 1/

@Phil Of course, it's not watertight. Sufficiently resourced and motivated citizens will overcome the barrier. People can get birth certificates. (But incentives will emerge to shape who retrieves those how easily as well; a saving grace with birth certificates is that state and federal politician incentives may not be aligned.) 2/

@Phil (Birth certificates also won't work for people — including many married women — who no longer retain their birth names.) 3/

@Phil For most people, especially for lower-effort potential voters, the passport will be to go-to proof-of-citizenship. People gain privileges beyond overcoming prerequisites of voting from a passport, so it's what not-super-motivated voters would choose, if they are going to deal with the bureaucracy of getting a new form of ID. 4/

@Phil So politicians will be able to statistically shape the electorate — to some degree, imperfectly — by monkeying with passport procedures in ways that make it easier for those they consider likely to vote for their side and harder for those who'd vote for the other side. Yes, it’ll be very leaky, but since our electoral system frequently yields (as its structural equilibrium) near 50:50 elections, small manipulations have big upsides. https://www.interfluidity.com/v2/7687.html /fin