❓WHAT HAPPENED: Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) announced her opposition to two GOP-backed voter ID and election integrity bills, signaling significant challenges for the legislation in the Senate.
👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: Sen. Murkowski, Congressional Republicans, President Donald J. Trump, and Senate Democrats.
📍WHEN & WHERE: Murkowski made her announcement on X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday, February 10, 2026, as the bills progress through Congress.
💬KEY QUOTE: “Once again, I do not support these efforts. Not only does the U.S. Constitution clearly provide states the authority to regulate the ‘times, places, and manner’ of holding federal elections, but one-size-fits-all mandates from Washington, D.C., seldom work in places like Alaska.” — Sen. Murkowski
🎯IMPACT: Murkowski’s opposition, combined with the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster threshold, likely dooms the voter ID bills without significant bipartisan support—unless Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) moves to end the legislative filibuster.
Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) has emerged as one of the key hurdles preventing the passage of two Republican voter ID and election integrity bills in Congress. With the House of Representatives set to take up a revised version of the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act and the Make Elections Great Again (MEGA) Act as early as Tuesday, the Alaska senator took to social media to announce her intention to oppose the measures—significantly reducing the likelihood that Senate Republicans can overcome a Democrat-led filibuster.
“When Democrats attempted to advance sweeping election reform legislation in 2021, Republicans were unanimous in opposition because it would have federalized elections, something we have long opposed. Now, I’m seeing proposals such as the SAVE Act and MEGA that would effectively do just that,” Sen. Murkowski wrote in a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday. She added, “Once again, I do not support these efforts. Not only does the U.S. Constitution clearly provide states the authority to regulate the ‘times, places, and manner’ of holding federal elections, but one-size-fits-all mandates from Washington, D.C., seldom work in places like Alaska.”
The passage of the SAVE Act—which would federally mandate voter ID—has become a priority for supporters of President Donald J. Trump and voters at large. Data from Gallup shows 84 percent of voters, including a large majority of Democrat and ethnic minority voters, back voter ID laws, while other polling shows 74 percent back the election integrity measure.
Still, setting aside Murkowski’s opposition, both the SAVE Act and the MEGA Act face an uphill battle in the Senate, where Democrat lawmakers are expected to filibuster the bills. This has led to increasing calls from Trump supporters for Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) to move forward with the so-called “nuclear option,” amending the chamber’s rules to abolish the legislative filibuster.
Attempts to pass the SAVE Act through both chambers of Congress in 2024 proved unfruitful, though the bill was adopted by the House of Representatives.
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