HR 884: To prohibit individuals who are not citizens of the United States from voting in elections in the District of Columbia and to repeal the Local Resident Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2022.

HR 884 in plain English: This bill would ban non-U.S. citizens from voting in any District of Columbia election and repeal a 2022 DC law that allowed noncitizens meeting certain residency requirements to vote in local DC elections. The DC law, which took effect on February 23, 2023, had permitted noncitizen local voting beyond the existing federal prohibition on noncitizen voting in federal elections.

Stated purpose

This bill aims to prohibit non-U.S. citizens from voting in any District of Columbia election and to repeal the DC law that had allowed noncitizen residents to vote in local DC elections.

Key points

• Prohibits non-U.S. citizens from voting in any DC election, local or federal
• Repeals DC's Local Resident Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2022, which took effect February 23, 2023
• Federal law already bans noncitizens from voting in federal elections; this bill extends that ban to DC local elections

Arguments supporters make

• Voting is a right tied to citizenship, and elections — even local ones — should reflect the will of American citizens, not foreign nationals.
• Congress has a constitutional responsibility to oversee DC, and ensuring only citizens vote there aligns DC with the standard that applies in all 50 states.
• Allowing noncitizens to vote, even locally, blurs an important legal and civic distinction between residents and citizens.

Arguments opponents make

• DC residents — including noncitizens — pay local taxes and are directly affected by local laws, so denying them any vote in local matters means taxation without representation.
• DC voters and their locally elected government chose this policy for themselves, and Congress overriding it undermines DC's limited self-governance.
• Many democracies and some U.S. localities allow noncitizen voting in local elections without problems, suggesting it is a reasonable policy choice communities should decide for themselves.

Tradeoffs

Restricting voting to citizens maintains a uniform national standard for who may participate in elections, but it removes from local democratic participation a group of people who live, work, and pay taxes in DC and are directly governed by its local laws.

Current status in Congress: Passed House.

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