Senate Majority Leader John Thune is planning to bring the House-passed SAVE America Act to the floor next week amid increasing pressure from President Trump and the MAGA base.
But the South Dakota Republican is still warning the bill is unlikely to pass, given Democratic opposition and GOP concerns about trying to use the talking filibuster to get around the 60-vote requirement.
“We don’t have the votes,” Mr. Thune said Wednesday.
Nonetheless, Mr. Thune still wants to have the debate about the SAVE America Act, which requires proof of citizenship to register to vote and photo ID to cast a ballot.
“There will be a vote, and everybody will get to go on the record,” he said. “We plan to do that next week.”
Mr. Thune said Republicans are still deliberating on what exactly the floor process will look like.
SEE ALSO: Sen. John Cornyn ready to blow up filibuster to pass SAVE America Act
The House passed the bill in a Senate vehicle, which lets Republicans skip the initial 60-vote hurdle and vote to proceed to the bill with a simple majority.
At that point, they may try to amend the bill to accommodate Mr. Trump’s requests to add three provisions.
On the election front, the president also wants to end mail-in voting with exceptions to accommodate the military, the disabled and people who are ill or traveling.
Mr. Thune said Republicans still have questions about how far Mr. Trump wants to go there.
“If somebody requests a ballot, that’s one thing. If they’re just shipping ballots out to people, that’s a different thing,” he said.
“This ballot harvesting thing, to me, is a real threat and a temptation to fraud in elections,” Mr. Thune said. “But as a general rule, if people are requesting ballots and they’ve got legitimate reasons for requesting them, I think a lot of states use that process and use it pretty well. So we’re working through what that actual proposal might look like.”
Mr. Trump also wants to add two nonelection priorities: blocking medical providers from performing gender reassignment surgeries on children and banning biological men from playing in women’s sports.
“We’re looking at how to accommodate his request to get votes,” Mr. Thune said. “And so that’s all part of the discussion we’re still having.”
Setting up amendment votes in the Senate is somewhat complicated. Leadership likes to control the process, so typically it fills the amendment tree on a bill to prevent any senator from being able to call up whatever amendment he or she wants.
To allow for amendment votes once the tree is filled, leadership then works to get unanimous consent to tee up votes on a select list of amendments. This requires cooperation from Democrats and can take days of backroom negotiations to satisfy all 100 senators.
One of the concerns some Republicans have about trying to use the talking filibuster to pass the SAVE America Act without needing Democratic votes is that it allows for unlimited debate and amendments — giving Democrats numerous opportunities to launch political attacks and potentially even secure enough GOP backing to change the bill.
That is why Mr. Thune is expected to ultimately file cloture to end debate on the bill, which is where the 60-vote requirement to end a filibuster is triggered.
Mr. Trump has warned he will not sign other bills until the SAVE America Act hits his desk, calling it a matter of “national survival.”
“It’ll make you — and I’m not doing it for this reason at all — it will guarantee the midterms,” the president told House Republicans earlier this week. “If you don’t get it, big trouble, my opinion.”
Mr. Thune said it would be great to pass the measure, but he does not view it as crucial to the midterms.
“I think the midterms will be about the economy, and that’s why we’re focused on that,” he said.
