John Thune is eager to let GOP senators out of the Capitol and onto the campaign trail as Republicans fight to hold the Senate majority in November. First, he has to get through the next eight days.
The majority leader is hoping to fund the government, confirm dozens of President Donald Trump’s nominees and hand him new powers to punish Russia’s trading partners before letting his members leave for a five-week recess. But Trump has turned Thune’s exit strategy into a cascading political test.
The vise-like pressure campaign was playing out as Thune sat down with POLITICO in his Capitol office Wednesday. At about the same moment, Trump was in the Oval Office insisting Thune “has the votes” to kill the Senate’s long-standing filibuster rule and pass a GOP elections bill. He went on to sow doubt as to whether he felt Thune was fit to lead the chamber’s Republicans.
“We will find out, and I will let you know,” Trump told reporters.
Unaware of Trump’s latest attacks, Thune in the interview nonetheless repeated that, no, he does not have anywhere near the votes to kill the filibuster or pass the SAVE America Act — the partisan elections bill Trump is pushing for. And he spoke frankly about the political risk Trump and other Republicans who are training their fire inward are assuming.
“I feel like we’re as well positioned as we can be,” Thune said of the midterm landscape, but “what we’ve got to do is just make the overarching narrative one that has us drawing contrast with our Democrat opponents rather than us shooting each other.” He held out hope that Trump would do just that as Election Day approaches.
The frustration with Trump’s intraparty attacks is widely shared among Thune’s colleagues but has been most frequently voiced by GOP members who are retiring or are otherwise insulated from Trump’s staggering political influence, like Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina.
Tillis downplayed Trump’s latest attacks Wednesday, chalking it up to the “typical tug and pull” among Republicans rather than a reflection of the president’s specific views on Thune.
Thune has up to this point acted more as a lightning rod for his conference, which is a traditional role for congressional leaders. But typically they attract bolts from the other party, not their own president.
In the interview Wednesday, Thune said he and Trump “get along” even as he acknowledged that he’s bearing the brunt of the president’s frustrations with the Senate’s inability to bend reality to his whims.
“He gets obviously frustrated with me because he sees me as the person that’s the impediment to some of the things he wants to get done. But as I continually point out … I don’t make this stuff up,” he said. “Math is math, arithmetic is arithmetic. … And part of it, too, is the active role he played in some of these primaries.”
“He thinks I can wave the magic wand,” he added. “I wish it were that easy.”
What has made things more challenging in recent weeks has been the sudden death of Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump confidant who was able to have frank conversations with the president about the realities of the Senate.
“He was a great intermediary, whisperer, whatever you want to call it,” Thune said. “But yeah, it’s a real loss. I do think that he had the kind of relationship where he could speak bluntly, candidly, directly, and the president would accept it.”
He added there are conversations now happening about “how to better have a better line of communication” between Senate Republicans and Trump’s orbit. Just after sitting down with POLITICO, he met with White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.
“We’ve got some people that can step into that role,” Thune said.
If the SAVE America Act was the only Trump-obsession Thune had to manage, it would be one thing, but the debate over the bill — which Thune supports — is also tied to Republicans’ attempt to enact a new party-line spending bill, which could include some election-related grant funding.
House Republicans managed to muscle through a $95 billion budget blueprint, but the path in the Senate is murky at best. Thune is dealing with deficit hawks who want at least part of the spending offset with cuts, defense hawks who want more Pentagon funding, and members who aren’t convinced there should be any bill at all.
But the White House is keeping the pressure on: Trump himself issued a public call for action on Truth Social Wednesday morning, and budget director Russ Vought pushed senators to move quickly in a private lunch just hours later.
Speaking in the interview shortly after the lunch, Thune said the budget blueprint Trump and his deputies are hoping to pass doesn’t currently have the votes to be approved. But he left the door open to a potential breakthrough before the end of next week while also acknowledging possible Plan Bs that could release at least some of the mounting pressure — possibly by putting pieces of the elections bill up for a vote.
“The question is, do we … trigger a vote on photo ID, put it on the floor, have a debate about it?” he said. “Those things are all kind of [things] we’re giving consideration to. But at the end of the day, does it change the outcome? I can’t see it.”
Thune also effectively ruled out holding a test vote on killing the filibuster. He warned that forcing what would essentially be symbolic votes would risk dividing Republicans while serving no practical end.
“You end up … basically for the 60 or 90 days heading into an election, fighting among Republicans, which to me seems really counterproductive, going into an election that’s pretty high-stakes,” Thune said.
Instead, Thune wants to make progress on other fronts. In addition to the sanctions bill, Thune wants to pass legislation funding the government past November — something virtually unheard of in July but something that he says is “trending in the right direction” nevertheless.
He’s also got nominees to confirm, and he’s looking to at least take an initial step on a cryptocurrency bill or college sports legislation. It’s an ambitious schedule for a month in the Senate, much less a week — especially when the president has his own priorities.
But Thune has consistently paid heed to his own constituency — the Republican senators who elected him to stay focused, put legislative wins on the board, and keep the GOP in the majority.
Thune has said he is planning to run for leader again in November, and most Senate Republicans believe he’s secure in his job.
Asked about the Oval Office comments later Wednesday evening, Thune initially danced around Trump’s equivocal assessment of whether he was “the man for the job” of leading the Senate GOP.
“That’s a decision that’s made by my colleagues,” he said.
But in subsequent comments, Thune joked that if Trump “could find somebody else to do this job, it might be a big relief.”
“It is what it is,” he added. “You just roll with it.”
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