GOP Senate Leader Rejects Trump’s Filibuster Demand to Pass Voter ID Bill — Calls Out ‘Paid Influencer’ Pressure

AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) rejected President Donald Trump’s ongoing demand to pass his voter ID bill, called The SAVE Act, by forcing Democrats to do a “talking filibuster.”

On Sunday morning, Trump praised pro-MAGA activist Scott Presler’s appearance on Fox & Friends Weekend and his promotion of The SAVE Act.

“Great Job by hard working Scott Pressler [sic] on Fox & Friends talking about using the Filibuster, or Talking Filibuster, in order to pass THE SAVE AMERICA ACT, an 88% issue with ALL VOTERS,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, adding:

It must be done immediately. It supersedes everything else. MUST GO TO THE FRONT OF THE LINE. I, as President, will not sign other Bills until this is passed, AND NOT THE WATERED DOWN VERSION – GO FOR THE GOLD: MUST SHOW VOTER I.D. & PROOF OF CITIZENSHIP: NO MAIL-IN BALLOTS EXCEPT FOR MILITARY – ILLNESS, DISABILITY, TRAVEL.

On Monday, NBC congressional reporter Brennan Leach asked Thune if Trump’s threat was adding to any sense of pressure to pass the bill.
“A lot of that is, it’s in that kind of, you know, paid influencer ecosystem,” he told Leach. Leach also reported of his answer:

Adds there’s support among GOP Sens, but “the process & how do you ultimately try & get a result is still unclear to me”

NBC’s Sahil Kapur reported that Thune went further in his explanation for rejecting forcing a “talking filibuster” to try to pass the bill.

“Having studied it and researched it pretty thoroughly, you have to show me how, in the end, it prevails and succeeds. Because I think what has been promised out there is that it would actually, in the end, get an outcome,” Thune said, adding:

And I find it very hard to see that based on actual past experience. There were a couple different occasions where the Democrats contemplated doing this, both under Majority Leader Harry Reid at the time and Majority Leader Schumer, and they opted against it because they examined it the same way that we’re examining it.

And obviously, what people don’t realize, I think, is it’s all unlimited debate, but it’s also unlimited amendments. So what I’ve said before is you have to have unified support, not only in support of the ultimate goal, which is the SAVE America Act, on the process to be able to defeat amendments that would undo the legislation the first place. And we can’t find a piece of legislation in history that’s been passed that way.

Presler hit back at Thune, saying, “Paid influencer system? I don’t receive a dime to do this work. It was after this interview with Fox News that President Trump put out a statement in support of my work & for the SAVE America Act. Telling millions of Americans that they are a “paid influencer ecosystem” — when he needs our votes to keep his majority in the Senate — probably isn’t the best strategy. CC: AK, IA, ME, NC, OH, TX.”

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