Media Bias Alert: Biden Opposes Bill Requiring Proof of Citizenship to Vote

The Biden administration released a statement Monday that formally opposes a Republican-led bill that would require voters to prove their standing as U.S. citizens in order to vote in federal elections.

The statement was covered by a plurality of outlets from the right, but AllSides did not find coverage from the center or left.

The bill, titled the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, was introduced in May of this year by Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) in the House and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) in the Senate. It is expected to make it to the House floor as early as this week, according to The Daily Wire (Right bias).

In the event of a Republican approval, it seems likely that the Democrat-controlled Senate and Biden would block the law. Although the statement did not specifically mention a veto, the administration said it “strongly opposes” the legislation.

The Biden administration said it rejects the bill because it’s “already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections” and that making a false claim of citizenship or unlawfully voting in an election is punishable by removal from the United States and a permanent bar to admission.”

Still, many on the right saw this statement as a significant development and an attack on American democracy, including Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) and House Speaker Mike Johnson, who raised the statement to the public eye when he posted it on X Monday.

Of the statement, Johnson wrote, “It should alarm every American citizen that the sitting President of the United States, who has opened our border to over 9 million illegals, just announced that he would veto our bill to prevent noncitizens from voting.”

Additionally, X CEO Elon Musk chimed in, quote tweeting the statement with the caption, “...”

Meanwhile, House Democratic leadership has urged caucus members to vote against the bill. House Minority Whip Katherine Clark’s office (D-MA) said the bill would “prevent Americans from registering to vote with their drivers' license alone” and “further intimidate election officials and overburden states' abilities to enroll new voters.” 

How The Media Covered It

From there, Biden’s statement was covered by several outlets on the right, including The Blaze (Right bias), The Center Square (Lean Right Bias), The Daily Wire (Right bias), Just The News (Lean Right bias), Newsmax (Lean Right bias), and Washington Examiner (Lean Right bias).

The outlets on the right that covered the story all aired fairly similar coverage of the story, prominently noting the Biden administration’s citing of existing laws as a main reason for strongly opposing the bill. 

Notably, the President’s statement was not covered by conservative heavyweights like Fox News (Right bias), The New York Post (Lean Right bias), or Fox Business (Lean Right bias).

However, several outlets across the spectrum ran separate coverage on the SAVE Act that didn’t mention Biden’s opposition, as dialogue swirled that the bill could make it to the House floor this week.

Over the weekend, Axios (Lean Left bias) and Fox News (Right bias) ran articles on the SAVE Act centered around Democrats’ opposition at large to the bill.

On Monday, Deseret News (Center bias) and The Daily Signal (Right bias) ran coverage of the act, while Straight Arrow News (Center bias) followed with coverage regarding the reported impending vote on Tuesday.

AllSides Analysis

While Biden’s statement opposing the bill seems to be a significant development in the story, only outlets from the right picked it up. Republican Speaker Johnson’s post on X may be what drove coverage of the story by outlets on the right, which is in line with the biases of these outlets. 

This could be viewed as a form of bias by omission by outlets from the left and center, although some of these outlets did cover the SAVE Act itself, just not Biden’s stance. This perhaps demonstrates that they didn’t feel Biden’s statement was particularly newsworthy due to existing U.S. law or the political nature of Johnson’s rhetoric.

Nonetheless, reading coverage from a balanced feed of news outlets can help readers better understand what may or may not be a significant development in a story, and better understand partisan perspectives that may only be coming from one portion of the news media spectrum.

Andy Gorel is a News Editor and Bias Analyst at AllSides. He has a Center bias.

This blog was edited and reviewed by Joseph Ratliff, Content Designer and News Editor (Lean Left bias) and Johnathon Held, Bias Analyst (Lean Right bias).