FOX 24 US
Good morning. It was great to meet all of you who came out to our event in New York last night with Marisa Kabas of The Handbasket.
Trump Tries to Raise the Stakes on SAVE Again
President Donald Trump made a show yesterday afternoon of preparing to throw Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) to the wolves out of frustration that the SAVE Act is not yet on track to pass in any form. The latest push is to jam parts of the bill through using budget reconciliation, which requires 51 instead of 60 votes, though Trump also continues to agitate for Thune to nuke the filibuster and pass the full voter suppression package.
Asked whether Thune is the right person to lead the Senate, Trump said, “We will find out, and I will let you know.”
“All right. Well, that’s nice of him, I guess,” Thune told Punchbowl. “I don’t know — what do you say on that? That’s a decision that’s made by my colleagues.”
Throughout Trump’s SAVE Act pressure campaign on his Senate colleagues, he has repeatedly made demands that misunderstand the reality of how the Senate functions, and how bills become law. He has seemed amendable to passing what everyone has taken to calling the “SAVE Act” through budget reconciliation, even though a SAVE Act done through reconciliation, while bad, would be without the nation-wide voter-ID and proof-of-citizenship mandates that are core to what the SAVE Act is. It is unclear whether Trump realizes this. He has refused to sign a popular housing bill, though without his signature it simply became law after 10 days; in doing so, the president achieved nothing on the SAVE Act while robbing himself of an opportunity to claim a victory on “affordability.” His demands for the SAVE Act to be attached to various funding bills dramatically complicated his allies’ attempts to fund ICE over Democratic opposition in the spring, and look sure to complicate government funding fights this fall.
When we see legislators take bills hostage, an increasingly common phenomenon since the Obama era that has often led to government shutdowns, the more effective efforts involve lawmakers carefully finding legislation where they have maximal leverage. Trump hasn’t done this — perhaps he doesn’t have the attention to detail to do so — and is as a result unable to truly achieve anything beyond making life considerably more frustrating for his fellow elected Republicans.
That’s the case this week, too. Thune is, of course, right that, in the end, Trump does not select the majority leader, though he may wish he did. Other senators do. Trump can’t oust Thune. But he can elevate him as a target at which his activist base should direct their hate.
Trump’s Blanche Nomination Gets Stuck
John Cornyn (R-TX) has caused a vote to advance Todd Blanche’s nomination for attorney general, scheduled for today, to be postponed.
- Yesterday, Cornyn said he was canceling a meeting with Blanche, explaining that he wanted to see a written modification to the settlement between Trump and the IRS that would have created the “anti-weaponization” slush fund.
- The DOJ told us it sent a written proposal to Senator Cornyn’s staff.” Cornyn told reporters, “I haven’t seen a single piece of writing that is responsive to what I’ve requested.”
- The vote could move forward whenever Cornyn gives the green light, though at this point that might not happen with enough time to confirm him before the Senate takes a month-long recess, beginning at the end of next week.
- The episode is more significant as a (perhaps short-lived) display of GOP Senate resistance to Trump than as an actual check on the DOJ: Even if Blanche isn’t confirmed, he can remain in the role as acting attorney general. And whatever the fate of the slush fund, settlements for right-wing activists continue, with the DOJ agreeing this week to pay more than a million dollars to an anti-abortion activist who was convicted in 2024 of conspiring to prevent access to a clinic, the New York Times reports.
Tabs
- Republicans may not end up following Trump’s endorsement and picking Darline Graham Nordone to fill her brother’s seat, the Washington Post writes. The Downballot gives a rundown of the many, many other candidates in the race, including some figures we’ve covered quite a bit over the years.
- Kash Patel has lost a defamation suit against an internet poster who called him a “googly-eyed Kremlin bitch” and a “chud,” the New Republic reports. U.S. District Court Judge for the district of Nevada Andrew P. Gordon found he did not have jurisdiction.
Man of the Hour
It’s Alex Jones, the onetime stalwart ally of President Trump who has now turned to demanding his impeachment over the Iran war to attract attention (which, admittedly, he is succeeding in doing). I used a gas station bathroom off I-95 the other day where someone had written “Alex Jones is right” on the soap dispenser — so make of that what you will.
