Sen. Schumer is lying with his claim of 21 million Americans would be disenfranchised. It’s unclear where this number comes from.

He has misquoted the numbers.

• 89% of adults have proof of citizenship documentation.
• 9% (or up to 30M) do not have “ready access” to their documents because they (a) are in someone else’s home, such as for a student away at college, (b) stored with another family member, (c) in a safety deposit box.
• 2% (or about 6 million) lack any citizenship documentation, notably, a birth certificate.

Until today I have not had a perspective on the SAVE Act. However, over the past week I have seen opponents routinely tell whopper lies like above. I dislike liars and arguments based on lies. Telling lies, repeatedly, crushes one’s argument – and persuades others to adopt the opposite position because of being fed up with the lies.

Telling lies is not going to be an effective way to win an argument.

Another one!

And estimated 98% of residents of Pennsylvania have a birth certificate (basically the same as the national average), which is the primary root document for citizenship (another one is a naturalization document). Hospitals file birth registration automatically at birth, and provide for parents to – almost automatically – request and receive a copy of the birth certificate.

This occurs because the birth certificate is usually required for:

• enrollment in school
• needed to request a Social Security registration number
• generally required for parent’s insurance policies
• and its simple and cheap to do there at the hospital

Based on the degree of lying going on with regards to this issue, I am leaning towards passing the SAVE Act.

If politicians can routinely lie about something that is so easy to verify, it implies every word from their mouths is likely a lie. And you wonder why no one trusts institutions anymore?

Here’s one of my posts on X to explain the situation

Research by the Brennan Center for Justice, Pew Research, the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement estimate that about 89% of American adults have citizenship documents, about 9% do not have “ready access” (typically stored at their parent’s home or a safety deposit box) and about 2% lack any documentation (no birth certificate). Immigrants who become a US citizen receive a naturalization document; almost all have their documentation.

Thus, it’s about 2% lack a birth certificate (costs about $10 to $31 to obtain). Most all naturalized citizens have access to their paperwork for obvious reasons.

Why don’t we solve the problem of providing birth certificates for free to the 2% that lack them? Hospitals file birth registrations for every child born there. About 1+% of births are “home births” and all states mandate that these be registered too. Most home births include a midwife or other health care practitioner and they are required to register the birth. It is estimated that today, near 100% of home births are registered. That said, some home births decades ago may have occurred before filing was common.

Finally, some may have lost a birth certificate due to a disaster (fire, flood, etc). However, they have to replace lots of documents when that occurs, not just birth certificates.