Outraged over President Donald Trump telling Republicans to pass his controversial voter ID bill “for Jesus,” La Shawn Ford, Democratic Congressional nominee, called the president’s latest partisan pressure tactic “despicable.”
With Palm Sunday, which begins Holy Week for Christians, just days away, Ford said this is a time when “some people and families reflect on the values of justice, compassion and love for our neighbors.
“It is unconscionable for any leader, including Donald Trump, to twist faith into a weapon for voter suppression,” said Ford.
“True faith does not manipulate our sacred principles for political gain. It uplifts our democracy by ensuring that every voice is heard and every vote is counted.
“Let us stand united against efforts that seek to disenfranchise citizens and remember that real leadership serves the people, not the political agenda,” Ford said.
He is not alone in voicing outrage over Trump’s tactics to get his voter ID initiative passed. Father Michael Pfleger told the Chicago Crusader, “It is both evil and lying on Jesus and the scriptures to justify his wickedness. The Evangelical right ought to be condemning him for it.”
Rainbow PUSH officials also weighed in, with Chief Impact Officer Rev. Stephen Thurston saying, “Invoking Jesus to justify voter suppression is not faith. It is fraud.
“The SAVE America Act claims to solve a problem that doesn’t exist because non-citizen voting is already illegal and vanishingly rare,” he said.
“This bill was never about election security; it’s about engineering who gets to vote before the midterms. Jim Crow didn’t announce itself either; it hid behind the language of law and order just as this does.
“We will fight this in every court, every precinct and every pulpit in America,” vowed Thurston.
Feeling pressure from public outcry over the spike in gas and food prices due to the war in Iran, and plummeting ratings, Trump sees the negotiations between Democrats and Republicans as a venue to push through his voter ID bill, which Democrats call another voter suppression tactic.
Trump told his allies to work through the Easter holiday and to pass the voter ID’s SAVE Act “for Jesus,” as TSA lines in airports across the nation continue to grow and the Homeland Security budget remains unfunded.
According to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials, 61,000 TSA agents are required to work without pay while ICE agents are paid from a different revenue stream. The TSA agents have been without paychecks since February 14. Hundreds of agents have either quit or cannot afford to come to work.
Trump made voter SAVE Act demands in Memphis on March 23 while attending a Republican roundtable. That is where he told Republicans to pass the SAVE Act “for Jesus” and ordered them to work through the Easter holiday to get it done.
However, with Republicans needing their votes, Democrats are digging in for the long haul. They are opposed to the SAVE Act because it would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote and a photo ID to cast their ballot.
The bill does not have the required 60-vote supermajority needed in the Senate, where Republicans hold 53 of 100 seats.
At an impasse since February 13, both parties have been unable to agree on an immigration enforcement proposal, where Democrats are demanding ICE agents not wear masks during immigration operations and must wear clearly marked uniforms.
They are also demanding that ICE agents not conduct enforcement activities near “sensitive” sites like schools and hospitals.
The Homeland Security budget has been unfunded since February 13 after Senate Democrats demanded ICE agents use warrants signed by court judges involving immigration activities, and not administrative warrants signed by an ICE official.
DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who was sworn into office Tuesday, told lawmakers last week that he supported returning ICE to pre-2025 guidance for search warrants.
In the interim, the war of words between Democrats and Republicans lingers. At one point, Republicans were ready to make a deal, but Trump adamantly said, “There will be no deals.”
Senator John Kennedy (R-La.) did confirm that Trump said, “no deals with the Democrats.” Kennedy added, “We could have had TSA (agents) paid by the end of the week, but the president said, ‘No deals’.”
According to the Brennan Center for Justice, the SAVE Act would be the most restrictive anti-voter bill ever passed by Congress.
In a statement, the Brennan Center said, “Since our nation’s founding, whenever Congress passed legislation regulating elections, it has largely expanded voting rights.
“In fact, it was 61 years ago this week when President Lyndon B. Johnson called on Congress to pass what would become the Voting Rights Act, which empowered millions of people of color to vote.
“Yet, when a war is raging in the Middle East and an affordability crisis is brewing at home, the Senate is poised to begin what could be a marathon debate on the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, a bill that would block millions of eligible American citizens from voting—reversing decades of progress.”
President Trump declared that this anti-voter bill should be Congress’s top priority and pledged not to sign any bills (except for funding for the Department of Homeland Security) until Congress sends him the SAVE Act.