U.S. President Donald Trump at Morristown Airport in Morristown, New Jersey, U.S., June 5, 2026. REUTERS/Nathan Howard
President Donald Trump, on Wednesday night, doubled down on his push for Congress to pass the controversial SAVE America Act — which would require voters to prove their U.S. citizenship by showing a form of ID other than a regular driver's license. And Trump, on Truth Social, wanted lawmakers to pass it as part of a "$350 Billion Reconciliation Bill" that would also include military funding. Journalist/author and Trump biographer Seth Abramson, in a thread posted on X Thursday morning, finds it extremely troubling that the president is tying voting and the Pentagon together.
Trump, on Truth Social, wrote, "We will defend the Homeland with the Golden Dome, launch the unstoppable Golden Fleet, dominate the skies with the F-47 and B-21, supercharge our ammunition stockpiles, and achieve total Space Force and Drone Dominance!.... Also, with THE SAVE AMERICA ACT, it will protect our Elections for Generations to come. Our Warriors protect our most Sacred Rights, and Voting is at the top."
On X, Abramson tweeted a screenshot of Trump's Truth Social post and warned, "Mark this moment. This is where the endgame begins — though it might take two years to play out. A President of the United States is openly linking the Pentagon and rigging elections for his party. He is framing an authoritarian takeover as something the U.S. military wants."
Abramson didn't mince words in his thread, warning that things could get really ugly in the United States.
"The natural endpoint of this comes sometime in the next two years, with Trump announcing that the Armed Forces must be deployed domestically to combat foreign election interference," Abramson tweeted. "He'll say Congress' failure to pass the SAVE Act forced him and the military to end our democracy…. In our form of democracy, there's no role whatsoever for the Pentagon in domestic elections. Yet the president just inextricably linked the two, having already had his openly Christofascist War Secretary deploy the military domestically in 2025."
Abramson continued, "This is going to get so bad…. And I wouldn't comfort yourself with the idea that a (Pete) Hegseth-led USAF would never do this. It would. Nor would I seek solace in the idea that any assemblage of U.S. citizens could possibly stand against a Hegseth-led USAF. It couldn't. We're waltzing into a fascist state…. Before the end, I fear that all Americans will understand only too well what many of us already do — namely, why Pete Hegseth made his top priority ensuring that no women or non-whites or non-Republicans will be in key command positions on the day he does what he's going to do."
In the Truth Social post that Abramson referenced, Trump reiterated, in all caps, his ideas for the SAVE America Act: "1. All voters must show photo I.D. (identification!). 2. All voters must show proof of citizenship. 3. No mail-in ballots (except for illness, disability, military, or travel)."
Critics of the SAVE America Act are arguing that it would make voting unnecessarily difficult.
In order to prove U.S. citizenship, a regular driver's license would not be enough — voters would also need an additional document, such as a U.S. passport or a birth certificate. But many Americans do not own passports, and critics are pointing out that the names married women currently use differ from the names on their birth certificates.
