House Passes SAVE Act via Must-Pass NDAA 216-212 While the EAC That Would Administer It Is Headless

House Republicans passed the SAVE America Act 216-212 on July 23, 2026 (per the Campaign Legal Center’s own cited update) by attaching it to the must-pass FY2027 National Defense Authorization Act — requiring documentary proof of citizenship to register for federal elections and photo ID to vote, with six Democrats crossing over. The bill moves to the Senate. The Election Assistance Commission, the body that would administer any implementation, has been without a quorum since Trump fired all remaining commissioners on July 9 (2026-07-09–trump-purges-election-assistance-commission-save-act-backdoor, 2026-07-10–trump-fires-eac-commissioners-hicks-hovland-after-humphreys-executor).

This is a distinct legislative stage from the June 30 Senate death of the same bill’s prior NDAA-attachment attempt (2026-06-30–save-act-dies-in-senate-ndaa-state-citizenship-proof-laws-spread) — the same must-pass-bill strategy revived and passed in the House a second time, now heading to a Senate that killed the identical maneuver three weeks earlier. That the administering agency has no confirmed leadership at the moment its own signature legislation clears the House underscores that implementation capacity, not just legislative passage, has become the binding constraint on this entire push.

Corrected 2026-10-01: corrected the body’s House-passage date from July 22 to July 23, 2026, per the cited Campaign Legal Center source (“On July 23, 2026, the House of Representatives passed a version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2027 that includes the SAVE America Act”). Also corrected the vote tally in the title, slug, and body from 217-209 to 216-212, per the U.S. House Clerk’s official roll call record (Roll Call 278, H.R. 8800, July 22, 2026: “yea: 216”, “nay: 212”) — the only floor vote on final passage of H.R. 8800; no roll call recorded a 217-209 tally. Renamed 2026-10-01 from 2026-07-22–house-passes-save-act-via-ndaa-217-209-eac-headless.