(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
President Donald Trump is reportedly planning on making Republican senators’ lives “a living hell” as part of his push to get them to ditch the filibuster.
According to Axios, the commander-in-chief isn’t just blowing off steam on Truth Social, he really wants to do away with the 60-vote requirement to end debate in Congress’s upper chamber.
“He will make their lives a living hell,” one Trump adviser told Axios while describing the president’s strategy for getting GOP lawmakers on board. “He will call them at three o’clock in the morning. He will blow them up in their districts. He will call them un-American. He will call them old creatures of a dying institution. Believe you me, he’s going to make their lives just hell.”
“He’s really mad about this,” added a second adviser.
Trump wrote the following on Truth Social Tuesday, the latest in a barrage of posts aimed at persuading Republicans:
TERMINATE THE FILIBUSTER
NOW, END THE RIDICULOUS SHUTDOWN IMMEDIATELY, AND THEN, MOST IMPORTANTLY, PASS EVERY WONDERFUL REPUBLICAN POLICY THAT WE HAVE DREAMT OF, FOR YEARS, BUT NEVER GOTTEN. WE WILL BE THE PARTY THAT CANNOT BE BEATEN – THE SMART PARTY!!!
Despite Trump’s campaign to do away with the filibuster, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) has remained unmoved.
“The votes aren’t there,” observed Thune on Monday.
The Wall Street Journal was more direct in an editorial on the matter, submitting that “Republicans would be dumb” to heed Trump’s call.
“The filibuster rule is often frustrating, but its virtue is that it serves as a check on passing extreme laws with narrow majorities. It also gives the minority party a voice when it controls neither House of Congress nor the White House. It forces compromise. It also reduces the chances of a ping-pong effect of passage, repeal, and passage again that leads to economic and legal uncertainty,” argued the Journal. “Some Senators, hoping to curry favor, may start to echo the President’s short-term opportunism. The Democratic left is quietly cheering them on.”