HB 4765 WILL SUPRESS YOUR VOTE

Editor:

On the surface, this bill may look like it’s about voter identification and preventing so called fraud,

but it’s really about making voting harder for eligible citizens in the state of Michigan. If this bill

becomes law, voters who have used their standard drivers license or state ID to register and/or to

vote, especially married women who have changed their name, would be required to present an

enhanced driver’s license or present other documents like a birth certificate or passport, documents

that many do not have or will need to purchase, in order to register and/or vote.

In addition, this bill would further burden the Secretary of State, clerk’s offices within counties,

townships, and cities, the Michigan Bureau of Elections, and the Department of State, by adding

administrative costs managing the new citizenship verification processes, as reported in the

Legislative Analysis by the House Fiscal Agency. The report also sites the potential need for additional

staff and that the state may need to conduct outreach and education initiatives for the voting public.

While election fraud has occurred in Michigan, for example, a Chinese student who voted illegally in

the 2024 election and admitted to it, leading to criminal charges in Washtenaw County, these cases

are few and far between. The Michigan Dept. of State conducted an extensive review of voter ID last

year and flagged just 15 potential noncitizen voters out of 5.7 million ballots cast. Nearly all were

deemed clerical errors and corrected. Our State’s registration and fraud prevention systems are

working well.

Noncitizen voting is extremely rare in all states, including Michigan. House Bill 4765 mirrors the

American Save Act that is under debate in the U.S. Senate. As National Urban League president and

CEO Marc H. Morial said, “Under the guise of combatting so called voter fraud, a solution looking for

a problem and one that does not exist, the SAVE Act will make it hard for millions of Amerian citizens

to vote.” This statement is true with Michigan’s HB4765!

The bottom line is that this bill is not good for democracy in Michigan and is intentionally designed to

supress your vote. Please contact your Michigan Senator for the 38th district, Ed McBroom at (866-

305-2038), state your name and county, and say “No” to House Bill 4765!

Luke Zastrow

Menominee

Frustrated Savior

Editor:

President Trump is a frustrated savior. If only he had been there, he could have fixed it all. For example, recently he said, “I would have won in Vietnam if I had been President.”

He also has reminded us that if he had been President, Russia would never have attacked Ukraine and Hamas would have never invaded Israel.

Seems like if Trump had only lived in Bible times, Jesus would never have been strung up on a cross and Noah would never have had to fill up an ark with animals.

We get it, Mr. President. Only you can fix anything and everything that ever goes wrong on planet earth.

You have been working hard to fix the November 2026 midterm elections, haven’t you? But what if you can’t? Then your house of perpetual saving grace comes tumbling down to the ground, doesn’t it sir?

Kimball Shinkoskey

Woods Cross, Utah