Bills to shrink Wyoming’s list of acceptable voter IDs are advancing in the House of Representatives.

The bills, which are among a litany of proposals related to elections, align with Secretary of State Chuck Gray’s “election integrity agenda,” which he announced ahead of the Wyoming Legislature’s 2025 general session. Third on that list was “strengthening Wyoming’s voter ID statute.”

Nixing Medicaid and Medicare cards as voter IDs

House Bill 206, “Elections-acceptable identification revisions-2,” would remove Medicaid and Medicare insurance cards from the list of acceptable voter IDs and add a provision to explicitly require a photo ID.

“Identification depends on recognition. If you want to identify somebody it is normal to use a photograph,” Rep. Nina Webber (R-Cody) said. “We recognize people by their faces. A Medicaid and Medicare card don’t have that.”

Rep. Chris Knapp (R-Gillette) said other states issue Medicaid or Medicare cards to undocumented immigrants. By removing them from the list of acceptable voter IDs, Wyoming would ensure it has secure elections.

According to KFF — an organization focused in part on public health information campaigns — undocumented immigrants are not eligible to enroll in federally funded medical insurance programs, which include Medicaid and Medicare.

Rep. Mike Yin (D-Jackson) said the Wyoming Legislature tried for several years to put voter ID regulations into statute. Gray sponsored the bill when he was a representative in an effort to create the statutory regulations in 2021.

“The only reason it passed was because there was a compromise made because there were several senior folks who were worried they were going to get disenfranchised. So, we stuck in this one sort of ID,” Yin said.

That bill included a provision to remove Medicare and Medicaid insurance cards from the list of acceptable voter IDs by Dec. 31, 2029. Gray said it was time to remove the cards now.

“I think, with the way voter ID has worked, that we can remove this provision a little earlier,” he said.

The House approved the bill on its second reading Friday; a roll call vote for the bill’s third reading could occur as soon as Monday.

No student IDs for voting

The House approved a bill removing student IDs from the list of acceptable voter IDs.

House Bill 160 — “Voter identification-revisions” would remove student IDs issued by the University of Wyoming, the state’s community colleges and public schools from Wyoming’s list of acceptable IDs for voting purposes.

Gray told the House Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions last week student IDs are problematic for voting purposes because they don’t indicate whether someone is an American citizen and could lead to voter fraud as they’re easily counterfeited.

Two University of Wyoming students told the same committee removing student IDs from the list of acceptable voter IDs would make it more difficult for students to vote and disenfranchise young voters. They also said UW students need another government-issued ID to obtain a student ID.

Yin said on the House floor earlier this week the Help America Vote Act requires the state to allow student IDs to be used for voter registration.

“This is removing a type of government ID and then you have this discontinuity, discongruity between IDs that are acceptable and the clerks have to accept them at registration but then they have to tell those students that they can’t use (the student ID) when they actually vote,” Yin said.

The bill awaits introduction in the Senate after it was approved on third reading in the House by a vote of 53-8. Reps. Laurie Bratten, Tom Kelly and Ken Pendergraft, all R-Sheridan, as well as Rep. Marilyn Connolly (R-Buffalo), voted in favor of the measure.