Please urge senators to vote “no” on the SAVE Act.
This act — the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act — is a false-flag operation. Under the guise of preventing voter fraud by noncitizens (a statistically insignificant event), it seeks to disenfranchise a large swath of citizens in one fell swoop. The act assumes all persons are noncitizens until they show documentation stating otherwise, making the entire population “undocumented” until they secure the proper documents (i.e., guilty until proven innocent). Immediately upon enactment, anyone who is unable to present a passport or certified copy of a birth certificate is denied the right to vote and is effectively undocumented.
The terms of the SAVE Act are designed to make proof of citizenship a high burden for a great many people, thus discouraging them from voting. A certified copy of a birth certificate is the core requirement, which is an expensive proposition for many people, especially Alaskans who may need to travel quite far to obtain such a copy. And what proof of identity is required to obtain a certified copy? Isn’t there a bit of circular logic here?
Consider the following categories of people who will have difficulty documenting citizenship:
• Married women who have taken their husband’s name
• Survivors of disasters such fire, flood, hurricane, tornado
• Inner city, poverty, foster-care, boarding school, broken home, homeless, and other displaced, traumatized or neglected persons
• Transgender and other persons who have taken a name change for whatever reason
Based on this list of vulnerable populations, the false-flag intent is clear: Make DEI-category persons undocumented and therefore “illegal.” Aside from the challenge to the right to vote, this act could be a step toward stripping citizenship from people. It is tantamount to a step toward “cleaning up” the population in fascist style. It is one of many subtle steps toward increasing the means by which federal and state governments may incarcerate people (as, for example, Gov. Dunleavey’s push to have protesters face felony charges for protesting).
Suppose for example, every citizen is required to carry proof of citizenship or face consequences. Given the Trump administration’s empowerment of ICE and the willingness to deport more or less indiscriminately, and refusal to remedy administrative errors in such processing, people who do not hold acceptable documentation could be “disappeared” very easily and in such a way that repatriation would be extremely difficult and costly. Add to this a prison system broadly privatized for investment profit, and you see clear potential for abuse. Even the Nazis began their shipments to the concentration and death camps as “deportation” and “resettlement” transports.
This SAVE Act is an extremely cynical ploy toward taking America a step nearer again to its antebellum roots, where women had no rights independent of a man’s will, alternative lifestyles were abominations, indigenous persons were savage animals, and millions of people were held as slaves based on non-citizen status.
To Sen. Sullivan, veterans and military personnel:
You served in the military, as did I. I spent a year in Iraq on the pretext of bringing freedom to the Iraqi people by American example (the mission was titled Operation Iraqi Freedom). Did Americans fight, suffer, and die in World War II, the Cold War, and in Afghanistan and Iraq, so that America should enact policies and laws which make it in governance and due process no different from those we fought against?
Military values include loyalty and integrity. Loyalty is noble and important, but you must remember that every mob boss, every gang, every criminal organization, demands loyalty. That is why integrity is so important. Integrity helps you to recognize or remember who you need to be loyal to. Authoritative title or party affiliation do not merit loyalty if it means you must compromise your integrity and succumb to corruption or, for the sake of loyalty, look the other way. The Trump Administration is corrupt. You know this. So far, Republican legislators have given him a pass because a ride on his coat tails is an opportunity. But how far is too far? Where is your integrity?
Recent actions by the Trump administration to deport even legal residents and then refuse to reinstate them after acknowledging administrative error should make legislators especially concerned about the Oath of Office. What value is an oath made by a liar? In the military, we make an oath to obey the orders of the president and to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Senator Sullivan, you are a senator now, not a soldier, and your oath is not to the President, but to the Constitution. Is your oath worth anything, or is it merely a breath of corruption?
The far right of the Republican Party is fundamentalist in its ideology, akin the the old hardline Soviets demanding party loyalty above all else, screw American tradition. The Republican Party has been corrupted by the MAGA movement, which is an extremist organization. The Republican Party no longer exists as a traditional, conservative party; it is being hijacked by extremists. Please take seriously your oath to the American Constitutional tradition and oppose these extremists who seek to corrupt and abuse us all.
Scott Justesen is a commercial pilot in Fairbanks and moved here in 2008 while serving in the Army.
