Rep. Diana Gonzales Worthen, D-Springdale, expresses her opposition to the Only Citizens Vote Act before the bill’s failure to pass the Arkansas House on Thursday, March 20, 2025. (Tess Vrbin/Arkansas Advocate)
The Arkansas House of Representatives failed to pass a bill that would have placed restrictions on non-citizens attempting to vote or register to vote, something that is both federally illegal and not happening in Arkansas, according to immigrant advocates.
The Only Citizens Vote Act, or House Bill 1422, would have changed both state law and the state Constitution. Changing the latter via legislative action requires a minimum two-thirds vote from lawmakers, or 67 votes in the House.
Only 53 House members, all Republicans, supported the bill. Fourteen more Republicans did not vote.
The constitutional change in question would have added references to the proposed new statute to Arkansas Constitutional Amendment 51, which lists the documents required for voter registration.
Those documents include a Social Security card and a driver’s license or state-issued identification card, both of which non-citizens are able to obtain, bill sponsor Rep. Wayne Long, R-Bradford, told a House committee that narrowly passed the bill Wednesday.
HB 1422 would have required the Department of Finance and Administration to share “names and identifying information of each” non-citizen with an Arkansas-issued ID or driver’s license with the Secretary of State’s office, which oversees elections.
If a non-citizen was found to be registered to vote, the bill would have required the secretary of state to refer the individual to the Attorney General’s office for prosecution, and the clerk of the non-citizen’s county of residence would have been required to cancel the person’s voter registration. The individual would have had the chance to provide proof of U.S. citizenship after being notified of the secretary of state’s actions.
However, there are “no documented cases” of non-citizens voting in Arkansas, so HB 1422 addresses “a non-issue,” said Democratic Rep. Diana Gonzales Worthen, the Legislature’s first Latina who represents the state’s first majority-Hispanic district in Springdale.
“Immigrants do not want to break the law, especially in this manner, because if they’re in line for citizenship, this will totally erase that,” she said.
Providing false information on a voter registration form, including about citizenship status, risks fines and/or imprisonment, according to the Secretary of State’s office.
HB 1422 would also have required the finance department to print non-citizen driver’s licenses and state-issued IDs in a vertical format. Individuals from ages 16 to 20 already have vertically printed ID cards, which Gonzales Worthen said would “cause confusion” and single out immigrants if HB 1422 became law.
Mireya Reith, founder and executive director of Arkansas United, and Maricella Garcia, race equity director for Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families, made the same point Wednesday when speaking against HB 1422 before the House Committee on State Agencies and Governmental Affairs.
Additionally, HB 1422 states that its non-citizen ID requirements would not be a valid federal ID. This would clash with the requirement for Arkansans to have a Real ID to enter a federal building or board a domestic flight from May 5 onward, said Rep. Nicole Clowney, D-Fayetteville.
There are 71,648 non-citizens legally residing in Arkansas, and any of them “could potentially be voting, but we don’t really know,” Long said Wednesday.
Clowney noted that altering tens of thousands of Arkansans’ driver’s licenses would cost $152,000, according to a fiscal impact statement from the state finance department.
No member of the House spoke for HB 1422, and eight Republicans voted present.
Six Republicans joined all 19 House Democrats in voting against the bill:
-Rep. Brandon Achor of Maumelle
-Rep. Julie Mayberry of Hensley
-Rep. Mark McElroy of Tillar
-Rep. Kendra Moore of Lincoln
-House Majority Whip Stetson Painter of Mountain Home
-Rep. Trey Steimel of Pocahontas
Mayberry and McElroy also voted against the bill Wednesday in committee.
Non-citizen voting is rare but has been legalized in a handful of cities nationwide, including in Washington, D.C., in 2023, leading to backlash from conservatives. Thirteen states – including Louisiana, Oklahoma and Missouri – have amended their constitutions since 2020 to specify that non-citizens cannot vote in those states.
President Donald Trump pushed the false narrative of non-citizens voting often in federal elections while he was campaigning for reelection last year, and U.S. House Republicans introduced legislation that would have required states to verify proof of citizenship to prevent non-citizens from voting in federal elections. The bill stalled in the U.S. Senate, which was controlled by Democrats at the time.
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