The following article was written by Alexandria McKenzie, one of the People’s Tribune’s 2026 Summer Interns.
It is no question that President Donald Trump’s second term has held remarkable levels of partisan hostility. Members of Congress are functioning under a leader that not only continually emphasizes difference over unity, but whose campaign depends on it. On June 23rd, however, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson defied the odds of his nation’s political moment. With 92% of Congress behind him, he passed one of the largest bipartisan housing bills onto the Oval Office desk.
The ROAD to Housing Act is a rare site where Republicans and Democrats have found common ground: housing in the United States is inaccessible and unaffordable, and reform must be made. The bill would restrict corporations from investing in single family homes, create pilot programs to expand access to mortgages under $100,000, and incentivize the development and preservation of opportunity zones.
On paper, it seems only logical for the President to sign the ROAD Act into law. Housing affordability was one of the key concerns in Trump’s second campaign. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, one of the President’s many allies in Capitol Hill, has expressed fervent support for the bill. In a June press release, he confidently claimed that the bill is a step to “bring the American Dream back into reach for millions of young and working families”.
Flags lined Statuary Hall on the day of the bills signing. A well-lit podium with the presidential seal sat in the center stage, surrounded by cameras and chairs for the invitees. But Trump made a move that blindsided Congress. Just minutes before the ceremony began, the President backed out.
The President quickly made it clear that this was a move to put pressure on Congress to pass his voting bill, the SAVE America Act.
In a Truth Social post, he stated, “Today’s Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency”.
The SAVE America Act focuses on strengthening states’ capacity for vetting noneligible voters. The bill’s supporters say the purpose of the bill is to ensure election integrity. It requires each person registering to provide a valid proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate, green card, or passport. State governments are responsible for this process, and registering applicants that do not pass citizenship requirements is punishable as a criminal offense.
The burden this bill would place on disabled voters, low income voters, and bureaucrats is unimaginable, but feared by many. In an interview with ABC, Representative James Walkinshaw of Virginia stated, “President Trump has decided that this bill to make it harder to vote is more important than our bipartisan bill to make it easier for Americans to afford a home…The American people desperately, desperately need affordability with respect to housing”.
But is it that simple? Trump’s refusal to sign the ROAD to Housing Act did not prevent it from becoming law – the stint was more of an inconvenience than a legitimate legal action.
This bill was also constructed as an echo to Trump’s own language. Co-sponsor Senator Tim Scott quoted Trump’s State of the Union in his remarks on the Act, exclaiming,“houses should be for people, and not corporations”. It unified divided representatives to serve the needs of the low income, the young, and the disenfranchised.
On the surface, the ROAD to Housing Act places a threat on Trump’s regime of division.
Beyond, it shines light on the entanglements between wealth, housing, and democratic participation. Donald Trump’s efforts to “protect the polls” is not purely about voting: it’s about the role that voter suppression plays in sustaining intergenerational poverty.
Low income renters account for a quarter of the US renting population, approximately 11 million households. Among this group, poverty is geographically concentrated and intergenerationally transmitted. A neighborhood is not simply where a cluster of people live: it determines a person’s positionality to unevenly distributed resources, such as quality schools, food and employment. These factors accumulate into a determinant of a person’s capacity to participate in elections.
While public policy determines the allocation of resources to these communities, they often have the lowest frequencies of voter turnout. Those who arguably bear the greatest weight from the ballot also face the highest barriers to reach the voting booth – a cycle of self-sustaining disenfranchisement.
While the ROAD to Housing Act pilots policy that enfranchises low income communities, the SAVE America Act only puts up more barriers. Low income renters, who are more likely to move than homeowners, would have to update their registration with each move. Updating registration is already an incredibly timely and difficult task, and requiring proof of citizenship would only make it harder. Passport ownership is correlated with income, as only 21% of those in households that make under $50,000 are valid passport holders. Not to mention, over half of Black Americans are in the same position.
The SAVE America Act not only excludes noncitizens from elections. It excludes renters, those who are low income, and people of color – the same group that the ROAD to Housing Act is designed to protect. These two bills have a lot in common, yet President Trump’s decision to protest progressive housing reform in order to uplift restrictive voting policy has widely been discussed in isolation. When we place history at the forefront, a new question is forced upon us: Whose votes are really protected under the SAVE America Act?
