Donald Trump canceled the planned Housing News Conference and Signing on Wednesday and said it would wait until Congress passes the SAVE America Act. The housing measure had been set up as a bipartisan step, but Trump tied it to a voting bill he called a national emergency.
“Today’s Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency,” Trump said on social media on Wednesday. That leaves the housing bill on hold while he keeps pressing Senate Republicans to act first on the voting measure.
John Cornyn and Bill Cassidy
The cancellation lands after Trump spent months pushing senators to focus on his proof-of-citizenship voting bill even though it does not have the votes to pass. The SAVE America Act would create strict new requirements for voters to prove citizenship and show voter ID at the polls. Trump has also demanded a ban on mail-in ballots, provisions to block sex reassignment surgeries on some minors, and a measure to prevent people born as men from playing in women’s sports.
That pressure has already run into resistance inside Senate Republicans. Trump endorsed primary challengers to Texas Sen. John Cornyn and Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, and both later lost their primaries. Cornyn said Tuesday, “If we’re going to win the midterm elections, we need to get on the same page,” and added, “We’re not on the same page now, and that I think is dangerous.”
John Thune
Thom Tillis said Tuesday that a lot of his complaints with the administration had already been communicated and said he hoped the meeting would be “conciliatory.” He also said, “That would be a big win for us tomorrow,” as Trump headed toward a closed-door Senate GOP luncheon for the first time in more than a year.
John Thune, who devoted weeks of floor time to the voting bill earlier this year, said Tuesday that it is “just not realistic” for the bill to pass. Trump still told a trip to Pennsylvania on Tuesday, “John is a leader and hopefully he can get the votes,” keeping the push in place even as Thune said there are not enough votes to scrap the filibuster.
The practical effect is simple for both sides: the housing signing stays tied to the voting bill, and Senate Republicans face another round of pressure over whether to change enough votes for the SAVE America Act to move. Whether they do so now becomes the question that decides if Trump keeps the housing measure on hold or finally lets it go forward.
