Senate GOP scrambling for a strategy to please Trump on SAVE America Act
Key takeaways
- Trump’s full-court press on his top two agenda items gives Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) little time to get them past a Democratic filibuster in the four months left before Election Day.
- The Byrd Rule governs what legislation is eligible to be included in a budget reconciliation bill, and MacDonough’s ruling infuriated Trump, who has repeatedly called on Thune to fire her.
- “Just because the parliamentarian says no, you have to keep taking her feedback and massaging, and there are some really big legal brains out there in the world that can help us,” said Sen.
Why this matters: political developments that affect policy direction and public trust.
Trump told GOP senators in blunt terms during the meeting Wednesday in the Senate’s Mansfield Room to find a way to pass the SAVE America Act — his preferred version of the bill — and Trump brought along Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth to press Republicans to also pass tens of billions of dollars in emergency funding for the Pentagon.
Trump’s full-court press on his top two agenda items gives Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) little time to get them past a Democratic filibuster in the four months left before Election Day.
Some GOP senators want Thune to attempt to jam the SAVE America Act — titled the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act — into a budget reconciliation bill that could pass the Senate with a simple majority, even though an effort to do so earlier this month failed when Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough ruled it did not comply with the Byrd Rule.