The fate of a bipartisan housing bill and the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE America) Act are up in the air after President Trump’s tense meeting with Senate Republicans.
Trump was scheduled to sign the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act on Wednesday, delivering a bipartisan win after months of negotiations in Congress and overwhelming support from both chambers. But he canceled the signing ceremony at the last minute, insisting that he would not sign the legislation until the Senate passes the major voting requirements bill.
That set the stage for Trump's lunchtime visit to Capitol Hill on Wednesday, a meeting already expected to potentially further strain relations with the Senate GOP.
The meeting ended up being even more explosive than some thought it would be, as Trump and Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who was defeated this spring by a Trump-backed opponent in a GOP primary, engaged in a yelling match over the Iran war.
In a sign of how much that meeting shook the Senate GOP and the White House, both sides quickly sought to make up.
Cassidy visited the White House on Wednesday evening, where he received a full briefing on the Iran war from special envoy Steve Witkoff.
The Senate GOP then brought a new Iran measure to the Senate floor almost identical to the one approved by the Senate — with four Republican votes — on Tuesday.
This time, in a 47-50 vote, the Senate rejected the measure. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) voted present instead of “no,” and Cassidy voted against the measure, telling reporters he was satisfied with what he heard at the White House.
Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) stood by their votes in favor of the resolution.
Where that leaves the housing measure was unclear, though the clear effort to mollify by the president by the Senate GOP could lead Trump to sign it. However, the Senate vote does nothing to change things for the SAVE America Act, which triggered Trump’s decision to not sign the housing measure.
The president took the Wednesday meeting to increase pressure on Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and fellow Republicans to abolish the filibuster or fire the Senate parliamentarian to get the SAVE America Act approved. The bill would require people to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote and show a photo ID upon casting a ballot.
Democrats are firmly opposed to the legislation, denying Republicans the ability to reach the 60-vote threshold required to overcome a filibuster for most votes. The GOP has sought to pass the bill through reconciliation, which only requires a simple majority in the Senate, but Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough has ruled the bill can’t be included in a reconciliation package under Senate rules.
Her position has led Trump to repeatedly push for her ouster, including on Wednesday.
Trump told reporters on the way out of the lunch that they had a “good meeting” and that the GOP is “unified,” but he signaled continued dissent within the conference.
“I don’t like a few people, but I think you know who they are,” he said.
The Hill’s Alexander Bolton reports that Senate Republicans expressed shock and bewilderment over Trump’s refusal to sign the housing bill without the SAVE America Act advancing, calling it “inexplicable.”
“I don’t know why you’re holding a bill that’s ready for signature hostage over a bill that will never pass this Congress, makes no sense to me,” said retiring Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who has emerged as a top critic of Trump within the party.
Senators noted that Trump didn’t veto the housing bill, still giving it a possible path toward going into effect.
The president has a few choices of what he can do — sign the bill, veto it or allow it to become law without his signature. After legislation is passed by Congress and sent to the president, it will automatically become law after 10 days if the president doesn’t veto it, even if he doesn’t sign it either.
If he vetoes it, the legislation had enough support in both chambers of Congress for lawmakers to override the veto. But the responsibility would fall to Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to hold the override votes and on lawmakers to hold the line, including Republicans, and buck the president.
That gives Trump a finite clock to attempt to use the housing bill as leverage. The president’s allies in the House are also attempting to use leverage to get the SAVE America Act passed, as Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) and other conservatives have said they will oppose all procedural votes and Senate-passed legislation until the bill passes.
The strategy forced at least a small recalibration from House GOP leadership, as they delayed planned votes to later in the afternoon Wednesday. But that strategy is too late to block the housing bill, and Senate Republicans aren’t showing signs of folding.
Johnson told reporters at a press briefing that he wants to push the bill through another reconciliation effort, saying he told Trump that it would be the only way to get it passed.
“I talked the president through that in detail this morning, as I have in the past, and he said, ‘Can we do it?’ I said, ‘We can, if the Republicans will stand together.’ We’re on the line right now to defend it. So that’s what we’re going to do,” Johnson said.
But even some hard-line conservatives are skeptical of the idea, The Hill’s Sudiksha Kochi reports.
“The save America act cannot be placed in reconciliation, and I’m not drinking the Kool-Aid. Neither should you,” Luna said in a post on the social platform X.
Trump’s allies in the Senate are firmly behind him, including Republican Sens. Mike Lee (Utah) and Rick Scott (Fla.), the latter of whom said Trump was “very forceful” in what he cares about at the meeting.
“I was a governor, and what you have to do is you have an agenda, you’ve got to let people know what your agenda is, and say we’ve got to figure out how to work together. And so that’s what he wants to get done, and he clearly wants to try to figure out how we can work together to get the right things done for the country,” Scott said.
But after the meeting and the pulled signing ceremony for the housing bill, Trump doesn’t appear to be any closer to reaching his desired finish line, at least for now.
▪ The Hill: Senate GOP tries to make up with Trump after explosive meeting.
▪ The Associated Press: What does Trump’s refusal to sign mean for buyers, renters?
