Documentary Proof of Citizenship (DPOC) bills have captured the imagination of federal and state lawmakers across the country since the reintroduction of the federal Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act in early 2025. In the months that followed, a deluge of states introduced their own versions of the bill.
These bills vary in specifics but generally require all voters to present documented proof of their citizenship whenever they register or re-register to vote—often in person, and with strict limitations on what counts as proof of citizenship. Recently, advocates and lawmakers have devoted much attention to the ways that DPOC bills will disenfranchise many eligible voters and disproportionately harm voters of color, low-income voters, disabled voters, military and overseas voters, and married women voters. However, less attention has been paid to the financial and administrative burdens these proposals impose on states and local governments. While both are important considerations, we focus on the latter in this white paper.
Our research shows that a DPOC system can cost a state millions of dollars to implement, maintain, and defend.
Our research shows that a DPOC system can cost a state millions of dollars to implement, maintain, and defend. Requiring applicants to present proof of citizenship significantly slows down and complicates the voter registration process. For each jurisdiction that passes such a bill, election officials need to develop and implement procedures for evaluating every applicant’s citizenship documents and recording the results. This involves changing voter registration forms, contacting voters about registration deficiencies, overhauling online databases, implementing data privacy protections for digital copies of documents, retraining all election officials to recognize and handle DPOC, accounting for staff time to review copies of DPOC, and, if a state’s law mandates it, devoting additional staff time to ongoing voter roll purges. Moreover, every jurisdiction that passes such a bill should significantly invest in voter education to make sure that voters know what documents they need and how to get them by registration deadlines. Yet, as our findings demonstrate, DPOC bills’ fiscal notes and similar analyses tend to grossly underestimate or completely ignore such costs.
Nor is there a singular, reliable database with citizenship information that could assist election officials in verifying citizenship. Federal systems like SAVE are not definitive, and state motor vehicle databases are not sufficiently up to date regarding citizenship information to be reliable. As a result, the costs compound once errors concerning voter eligibility are factored in. Thus, DPOC systems come with what we term “system error remediation costs”—high costs associated with correcting administrative mistakes, fixing wrongful voter purges, and related litigation.
We conclude that no matter how a state may choose to structure a DPOC bill, the costs and administrative burdens will be substantial.
In this white paper, we look closely at the costs that two states, Arizona and Kansas, have incurred due to DPOC legislation. First, we lay out our findings concerning the high costs that Arizona and Kansas have each faced to implement and maintain DPOC systems. Next, we describe how each state has incurred more in system error remediation costs. As we explain below, our findings represent a floor, rather than a ceiling, concerning the magnitude of expenses a state contemplating a new DPOC bill can expect. We then draw examples from a handful of additional states to demonstrate how existing state DPOC bills tend to grossly underestimate, or flat-out ignore, state and local costs of implementation and maintenance. We conclude that no matter how a state may choose to structure a DPOC bill, the costs and administrative burdens will be substantial.
Download the full white paper
