President Donald Trump has pushed Senate Republicans to the brink of their patience, and they’re not staying quiet about it.
The president in recent weeks has been firing out missives Republicans view as bad decisions that undermine their ability to deliver legislative wins as the midterms approach.
The latest irritation was the early-morning Truth Social post Wednesday, where Trump upended GOP plans to quickly confirm Jay Clayton as the new director of national intelligence and revive a key surveillance bill that the president already derailed earlier this month.
“The president’s timing and communication needs improvement,” Sen. Shelley Moore Capito said. “I think it’s unfortunate. It throws a kicker into the system when we get going and then we have to readjust.”
Trump’s U-turn on Clayton is one of several fronts where senators have pushed back in recent weeks. Republicans also foiled plans to fund part of his White House ballroom project in a recent immigration enforcement funding deal and forced the Justice Department to abandon plans for a $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
Sen. John Kennedy answered “No” when asked if Trump takes senators into consideration: “He wants what he wants, and until he gets it, he just keeps pushing.”
Sen. Thom Tillis, who announced his retirement last year after breaking with Trump on policy legislation, said the dynamic is “undermining our ability to produce the very results he wants.”
The frustrations are also bubbling up as the president is trying to sell an Iran peace deal that a section of his party despises (more on this below).
To Trump, the solution is simple: None of this would matter if Republicans would just follow his lead.
Trump has handed Republicans a midterm playbook they’re unlikely, and unable, to heed: get rid of the filibuster, fire the Senate parliamentarian and pass an election security overhaul known as the SAVE America Act.
“If everyone just follows his lead, follows the blueprints he’s laid out, and runs on the record that he has, then I think we’ll fare well,” said a senior White House official, granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
Trump’s controversial demands, however, have been unfortunately timed as lawmakers have been on the precipice of delivering policy goals. His naming of Bill Pulte as acting DNI, for example, blew up a brewing three-year deal on reauthorizing a key piece of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. His announcement of the DOJ payout fund delayed and nearly killed a critical immigration funding bill.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said his relationship with Trump was “fine” amid the public turmoil. He later explained in an interview the White House and Senate Republicans do a “fair amount of coordination.”
“But sometimes you get surprised,” he added. “It’s a business model the White House employs, and we’ve had to figure out how to be adaptable.”
What else we’re watching:
— TRUMP’S IRAN DEAL RACKS UP BIPARTISAN CRITICS: Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle panned the details of the memorandum of understanding Trump signed in hopes of ending the conflict in Iran. Sen. Bill Cassidy called the agreement “the worst foreign policy blunder in decades.” “Before the war, the strait was open, Iran was being crushed by sanctions, and 13 service members were still alive,” Cassidy posted on X. “Now, 13 Americans are dead, families have paid billions at the pump, sanctions will be lifted, and the bombing has stopped.”
— SENATE GOP COOL ON ‘RECON 3.0’: Senate Republicans have taken no concrete steps toward advancing Trump’s ask for a $350 billion party-line bill to fund the military and notch other conservative policy victories. Senators acknowledge the tough path for marshaling 50 votes behind such a measure on their side of the Capitol just months before the midterms. Members and aides in interviews this week said it was becoming clear any “Reconciliation 3.0” would be a House-led effort.
Jordain Carney, Meredith Lee Hill, Katherine Tully-McManus, Megan Messerly, Alex Gangitano and Myah Ward contributed to this report.
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