Finally getting close with this one, first painting of the year.

CalPortland Cement Terminal beneath the Fremont Bridge,
on the east bank of the Willamette River, Portland, Oregon. c. 2010.

Oil on canvas. 18” x 24”

MEGA federalizes elections in the name of “integrity” — while making voting harder, riskier, and more bureaucratic for millions of eligible voters.

Text of HR 7300 ⬇️

www.congress.gov/bill/119th-c...

4: Voter roll purges
States must aggressively remove voters flagged by databases — even when errors are common.

5: Ranked-choice voting banned in federal elections.
MEGA decides how Americans are allowed to vote.

4: Voter roll purges
States must aggressively remove voters flagged by databases — even when errors are common.

5: Ranked-choice voting banned in federal elections.
MEGA decides how Americans are allowed to vote.

2: Proof of citizenship requirements baked into registration and verification systems.
Burden shifts from the state → the voter.

3: Mail voting restrictions
– Ends universal vote-by-mail
– Ballots must arrive by Election Day

MEGA doesn’t just touch voter ID.
It rewrites rules for registration, voting, mail ballots, vote counting, voter rolls, and voting systems nationwide.

1: National photo ID requirement to vote in federal elections.
States lose flexibility. One federal rule for everyone.

The House bill however, called the “MEGA Act” or Make Elections Great Again Act is
despite the slogan, not just one reform — it’s a full federal takeover of how elections work.

The Save Act expired with the 118th Congress because it was too flawed for the Senate to consider it.
Now in the 119th both houses are pushing variations. The Senate has added to the original demands for proof of citizenship that the voter ID include a photo.

Restrictive registration policies are advanced by Republicans, while Democrats consistently support automatic and same-day registration. This asymmetry aligns with the electoral effects of those policies. See: National Conference of State Legislatures; Brennan Center voting laws tracker.

Stricter registration and voting requirements disproportionately affect young voters, lower-income voters, renters, and voters of color—demographic groups that lean Democratic in national elections. See: Pew Research Center; academic studies on voter ID and registration policy effects.

Turnout among registered voters
In recent U.S. presidential elections, roughly 65% of eligible voters cast ballots, while ~88–90% of registered voters do so, indicating registration—not motivation—is the binding constraint. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Voting and Registration Supplement.

Courts and election administrators have found no evidence that voter fraud has changed the outcome of a presidential or congressional election despite extensive post-election litigation and audits. See: Brookings Institution; state election audits following 2016, 2020, and 2022 elections.

Multiple studies find voter fraud rates between 0.00004% and 0.0009% of ballots cast, with impersonation and double voting among the rarest offenses. See: Brennan Center for Justice, The Truth About Voter Fraud; Brookings Institution, How Widespread Is Election Fraud in the United States? Not Very.

When a party repeatedly advances voting restrictions justified by hypothetical fraud, and those restrictions consistently produce partisan advantage, it is reasonable to conclude the goal is electoral advantage, not election integrity.

Sources⬇️

What these policies do reliably accomplish is reducing participation among young voters, low-income voters, renters, and voters of color, groups that tend to lean Democratic.

Voter Fraud/Voter ID

Voter fraud in the United States is exceedingly rare. After decades of scrutiny, hundreds of millions of ballots cast, and repeated investigations by courts and election officials from both parties, there is no evidence it has ever altered the outcome of a major election.

Now playing.

Most polls never ask whether ID rules should:
• apply to mail ballots
• override signature verification
• increase ballot rejections
• burden local election officials

So “support for voter ID” often masks a second question:
Should mail voting be restricted through ID rules?

Voter ID polls well because people picture a simple, in-person ID check.
That’s not what the SAVE Act primarily affects.

SAVE would tie new ID requirements to registration and mail voting, not just Election Day voting.

If the federal standard shifts from “signature + attestation” to “documentary proof,” routine maintenance can become re-verification.

Even without an explicit mandate, it may trigger update demands when voters move, correct records, or are flagged in list maintenance — hitting mail voters first.

One under-discussed risk in the SAVE Act debate:
What happens if signature-only verification for mail voters is no longer treated as sufficient?

Many mail-voting states rely on signatures as the continuity check that keeps voters active without repeated in-person steps.

If lawmakers are going to rely on voter ID polling to justify this bill,
they owe the public an honest discussion of cost, time, and who gets left out.

That conversation now moves to the Senate.
Ask your senators⬇️

Who is most affected?

• seniors without passports
• rural voters far from offices
• students and young voters
• low-income voters
• married women with name mismatches
• mail voters who rarely appear in person

This isn’t about ID in theory.
It’s about access in practice.

The logistics aren’t trivial:

• Birth certificate: $25–$50, often weeks to process
• First-time passport: ~$165 in fees (+ photos), must apply in person
• Processing time: 6–10 weeks (faster costs more)

Often this takes multiple steps, not one.

What the SAVE Act (H.R. 22) actually requires is documentary proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote.

That means either:
• a U.S. passport, or
• a government photo ID + a certified birth certificate (or similar document)

Most driver’s licenses — even REAL ID — don’t show citizenship.

🧵

Most voter ID polling asks about “ID” in the abstract.
It does not ask whether voters would need to pay fees, gather documents, wait weeks, or show up in person to comply.
Those details matter — and they’re missing from the polls.

Wow! Nice work!

It’s been a while but I managed to get this close to done.

East Side industrial area and the Fremont Bridge.
Oil on panel, 12” x 24”

The big feud between dumb and dumber is the greatest gift to MSM since Watergate but they’re too broken to make it happen.