LANSING, Mich. — Republicans unveiled plans Wednesday to pursue an amendment to the Michigan Constitution that would require voters to show proof of U.S. citizenship to register and show photo identification to cast a ballot.

Rep. Bryan Posthumus, R-Rockford, said he will introduce the proposal next year after Republicans take control of the House. Two-thirds of the lawmakers in the House and the Democratic-controlled Senate would have to vote in support of his measure for it to be considered by Michigan voters.

Alternatively, a committee could gather petition signatures — more than 440,000 would be required — to put such a proposal on the statewide ballot. A group called Committee to Protect Voters' Rights has launched a website in support of the Posthumus plan.

"Not one American citizen should have their vote canceled out by a noncitizen,” Posthumus said in a statement Wednesday. "This is not and must not be a partisan issue. I look forward to working with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to immediately pass this constitutional amendment."

In Michigan, only U.S. citizens are eligible to register to vote or cast a ballot under current law.

However, Michigan's voting policies have increasingly gained the spotlight over the last four years after Republican Donald Trump claimed, without providing proof to back up his assertions, that widespread fraud caused him to lose the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden. This fall, Trump won the 2024 election in Michigan by 1.4 percentage points over Democrat Kamala Harris, 49.7%-48.3%.

On Oct. 30, the Michigan Secretary of State's office and the Washtenaw County Prosecutor's Office revealed a 19-year-old University of Michigan student from China, who was not a U.S. citizen, had cast a ballot. The news made national headlines, as Republicans across the country had been voicing concerns about the potential ability of noncitizens to vote.

The University of Michigan student, Haoxiang Gao, was charged with perjury — making a false statement on an affidavit for the purpose of securing voter registration — and being an unauthorized elector who attempted to vote.

This week, Posthumus said the recent incident of a non-U.S. citizen voting in Michigan’s election had spurred the need for action.

Gao had registered to vote using his UM student identification and other documentation establishing residency in Ann Arbor, signed a document attesting under penalty of perjury that he was a U.S. citizen and his ballot was entered into a tabulator, according to the Secretary of State's office.

Under federal law, the voter registration application in each state must note the requirement that people be citizens to cast ballots and contain an attestation that the applicant meets the requirement.

Chris Thomas, Michigan's former elections director, said the details of how Republicans would attempt to require proof of citizenship and photo identification would be important. Thomas said he was concerned the policies could tamp down on legal voters' ability to cast their ballots.

“Who carries around citizenship papers?” Thomas asked.

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson's office has said there's "no evidence to support claims that large numbers of noncitizens have voted in past elections."

"Any instance of illegal voting by noncitizens in Michigan has been investigated by the appropriate authorities," the Secretary of State's office has said. "There is no evidence that these votes — or any other instance of voter fraud — have happened at any significant scale."

Currently, if states require different minimum rules for voters to prove their citizenship, they might have to offer different types of ballots for federal races and for those that include state or local races.

Only Arizona has been doing that, requiring documented proof of citizenship, according to the Voting Rights Lab, which tracks voting policies across the country. Among the documents Arizona accepts for proof of citizenship are copies of a birth certificate and pertinent pages of a passport.

Separately, in 2021, Republicans in Michigan launched a petition to mandate that voters present photo ID to cast their ballots in person, but their proposal didn't make the ballot. Michigan voters approved a different amendment in 2022 that specifically said people could use a photo ID or a signed affidavit to verify their identity.

Proposal 2 of 2022 passed with 60% support.

Posthumus argued several states had similar proposals on their ballots this year to what he was pursuing. But he acknowledged the ballot language will have to be “thoughtful” to ensure elections remain both “accessible” and “secure.”

“There’s a way to do it and we have to be very thoughtful with it,” Posthumus said. “We have to be very careful with what the language says.”

Numerous Republicans came out in support of the Posthumus plan on Wednesday.

In a social media post on X, Ronna McDaniel, former chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, urged people to support the effort.

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