SAVE / SAVE America Act

The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, if passed, would require anyone registering to vote to provide proof of U.S. citizenship—a valid U.S. passport, or a photo ID presented with a certified birth certificate. If the SAVE Act becomes law, it will affect large groups of people who have changed their names, primarily women who could be turned away from voting if the names on their ID and birth certificate don’t match.

Keeping Score: Pennsylvania ERA Secures Abortion Rights Win; Civil Rights Groups Investigate Trump Admin Delays in Childcare Payments; Senate Upholds Near-Total VA Abortion Ban

PUBLISHED 4/23/2026 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week:
—In a landmark ruling shaped by Pennsylvania’s ERA, a state court struck down a decades-old ban on using Medicaid funds for abortion.
—Trump continued to attack voting rights, threatening mail-in ballots and moving towards a nationalized registration database full of errors.
—An estimated 8 million people attended the latest “No Kings” protests.
—A Michigan court ruled that the state’s Pregnancy Exclusion law, which prevents providers from honoring pregnant women’s documented end-of-life decisions, violates a voter-approved 2022 constitutional amendment.
—A federal judge blocked RFK Jr.’s changes to routine vaccination schedules.
—The Supreme Court ruled against Colorado’s ban on dangerous “conversion therapy” for LGBTQ youth.
—Housing markets are declining in states with abortion bans as young people leave or avoid those areas.
—Senators demand the Trump Administration release lifesaving Title X funding.
—Twenty-five states received a failing grade on access to sexual and reproductive healthcare.
—High levels of contamination were found in braiding hair.
—Women are driven away from coaching college sports by pay inequities and other systemic barriers.

… and more.

Fewer Teen Births Is Good, Unless You’re the Patriarchy

PUBLISHED 4/17/2026 by

How on-brand for the federal government to announce that U.S. birth rates are falling—just as The Testaments, the long-awaited sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, dropped on Hulu.

In the fictional nation of Gilead, first envisioned by Margaret Atwood in her 1985 dystopian novel and expanded on screen for nearly a decade now, declining fertility catalyzed a Christian nationalist revolution in modern-day America, spawning a society rooted in patriarchal dominance and state-sanctioned violence. The Testaments, now three episodes in, is making a deliberate appeal to Gen Z and young viewers, featuring the spectacularly savvy Chase Infiniti and Lucy Halliday among Gilead’s tradwife-in-training rebels.

Doubly fascinating then, that it is the real-life status of teen birth rates in particular now driving the news. In a drop considered “extraordinary” by statisticians, the number of babies born to mothers between the ages of 15 and 19 fell by 7 percent in 2025.

Nevertheless, many on the right jumped directly into the fray to publicly lament that teens are having fewer babies.

From Dolores Huerta to Cynthia Richie Terrell, Celebrating the Birthdays of the Women Keeping Movements Alive

PUBLISHED 4/10/2026 by

Weekend Reading on Women’s Representation is a compilation of stories about women’s representation in politics, on boards, in sports and entertainment, in judicial offices and in the private sector in the U.S. and around the world—with a little gardening and goodwill mixed in for refreshment!

This week:
—Chris Taylor wins her race for Wisconsin Supreme Court.
—Emily Gregory flips a Florida House seat in Trump’s backyard.
—New data says that women could definitely win the 2028 presidential election.

… and more.

Furious, Fearless and Defiant: Our Favorite Protest Signs From No Kings 3.0

PUBLISHED 3/30/2026 by and

On Saturday, March 28, 2026, millions showed up for the latest wave of No Kings protests, drawing an estimated 8 million people across more than 3,300 events worldwide.

The flagship event was held in Minneapolis-St. Paul, the site of a controversial immigration enforcement surge resulting in the deaths of two residents, Renée Nicole Macklin Good and Alex Pretti, at the hands of federal agents.

The SAVE Act Is Designed to Erode Access to the Ballot. The Woman Who Built the Largest Voter Protection Operation in History Is Not Surprised.

PUBLISHED 3/23/2026 by | UPDATED 5/1/2026 at 7:25 A.M. PT

The Senate has begun debating the SAVE America Act—a bill that would require Americans to show a birth certificate or passport just to register to vote.

Rachana Desai Martin is not surprised. She has spent her entire career watching exactly this happen.

Desai Martin is one of the only people in the country who has spent her career building the infrastructure to protect both voting rights and reproductive rights. She has seen both fights from the inside. And what she sees—clearly, consistently, without drama—is that these are not two separate battles.

“At base, both of these things are really about power and control,” she told me. “When we’re advocating for reproductive rights, it’s to give people power over their own bodies and their lives and their families and their futures. When we’re talking about voting rights, it’s to give people the power to pick their representatives and have their government work for them.”

Same target. Same architecture. Same playbook.

Yeah, the ’90s Were Cool, but We’re Ready to Fight Now

PUBLISHED 3/20/2026 by

“Mom, what were you like in the 90s?” The question has gone viral—and the response, a flood of celebrity flashback montages, captures the likes of Halle Berry and Courteney Cox in their Kodachrome heyday, set to (what else?) the Goo Goo Dolls’ “Iris.” The trend dovetails FX’s Love Story, the trashy yet wildly popular mini-series purporting to depict the behind-the-scenes courtship and ill-fated marriage of Carolyn Bessette and John F. Kennedy Jr.

I always appreciate when Gen X, the perennially forgotten generation, gets its props.

The Filibuster Is No Virtue

PUBLISHED 3/19/2026 by

Republicans have put on the Senate floor (barely, with only 51 votes) their massive voter suppression bill, inaptly named the SAVE America Act.

What will likely trip up Republicans is not the substance of the bill, but fiddling with the filibuster, which will be necessary to pass this anti-democratic monstrosity. A critical segment of the Republican Senate caucus cares about maintaining the filibuster, a tool Republicans have used repeatedly to block bills with majority support, such as reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act.

Keeping Score: Trump Attacks Iran, Pressures Senate Republicans to Pass ‘Show Your Papers’ Voter Registration Bill; States Expand Access to Childcare and Paid Leave

PUBLISHED 3/19/2026 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week:
—Dolores Huerta breaks her silence at 96: “I have never identified myself as a victim, but I now understand that I am a survivor.”
—Trump pressures Senate Republicans to pass the SAVE America Act, a “show your papers” policy that would require U.S. citizens to show a passport or birth certificate in order to register to vote.
—A performative personnel exchange at DHS: from Kristi Noem … to Markwayne Mullin?
—The U.S. and Israel launched strikes on Iran, killing at least 1,332 people.
—March 10 is Abortion Provider Appreciation Day.
—DHS Secretary Kristi Noem was fired, as ICE reports 32 deaths in detention facilities in 2025.
—Access to early prenatal care is declining in the U.S., especially in states with abortion bans.
—A record one-third of American workers not have access to government-mandated paid leave.
—The U.S. deported a gay woman to Morocco, where her sexuality is illegal and she faces violence from her family.
—Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton claimed gender-affirming mental healthcare for trans youth is “child abuse.”
—New Mexico and New York take steps towards free universal childcare.
—Jessie Buckley took home the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her role in Hamnet. The film was directed by Chloé Zhao, one of nine women to ever be nominated for the award of Best Director and the only woman nominated this year.

… and more.

Kristi Noem Is Out at DHS—But Women May Not Be Safer Under Her Replacement

PUBLISHED 3/9/2026 by

As frontline witnesses to the worst of humanity, physicians carry the heavy burden of moral distress—the anguish of seeing harm unfold and feeling powerless to stop it. This feeling has only grown with the rise of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in its current form. Its inhumanity under former DHS Security Kristi Noem’s leadership—reflected in the anxieties of our patients, many of whom are avoiding essential medical care out of fear—has us despairing with helplessness.

So, yes, many of us were excited to see Noem go.

The hope that swelled with Noem’s ousting vanished quickly with news of President Trump tapping Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) as her replacement, a former MMA fighter and co-sponsor of the SAVE America Act, which disproportionately targets women’s voting eligibility. Mullin holds extremist views on abortion, opposing even exceptions to save the mother’s life. Deeply disturbing is Mullin’s 2013 vote against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act.

While Noem’s firing is a step in the right direction, appointing a manosphere-adjacent fitness bro whose rhetoric of “protection” echoes the same ideology predicated on women’s forced subjugation—and whose political track record shows a distinct disdain for women’s lives—as her replacement is absolutely not the move.

FAQs About the SAVE America Act and Its Impact on Voters

PUBLISHED 3/2/2026 by and | UPDATED 3/25/2026 at 11:57 A.M. PT

As the SAVE America Act heads toward a Senate showdown, Republican leaders are preparing marathon debate sessions that could stretch late into the night. The legislation, backed by Trump, would require Americans to present documentary proof of citizenship, such as a passport or birth certificate, in order to register to vote in federal elections.

As the political fight intensifies, confusion about what the bill would actually require has spread widely online and across social media. Supporters describe the measure as a simple election-integrity policy, while critics warn it could create sweeping new barriers for millions of eligible voters who do not have ready access to the required documents—including many women whose current legal names may not match the names on their birth certificates after marriage.

To cut through the noise, Ms. has put together this guide to the SAVE America Act, answering common questions about what it would do and how it could affect your right to vote, including: Does a Real ID count? What if I can’t find my passport? And why are Trump and Republicans pushing so hard for this bill?