Senate Leader Snaps Over Trump Trying to Force a Vote on SAVE Act

Senate Majority Leader John Thune tore into Karoline Leavitt Thursday, rebuking the press secretary hours after she announced that the White House was losing patience with his inability to pass Donald Trump’s wildly unpopular SAVE America Act.

“Well maybe she or somebody else ought to get on the phone and get the votes, right?” Thune told reporters. “It’s 50 around here. And, so, instead of pointing the finger at Republicans, they might think about going after the people who are stopping it on the floor, which is the Democrats.”

“And if there are Republicans that they think are gettable, get on the phone. Let’s get them to ‘yes,’” he added.

At a press conference earlier in the day, Leavitt revealed that the president’s “patience is running out.”

“He wants to see as much of the SAVE America Act passed by the August recess,” Leavitt said. “He knows that’s what the American people want to see passed.”

The Senate goes into recess on August 7. The House, which began its month-long recess Thursday, voted 216–214 to adopt a budget blueprint Wednesday night that included portions of Trump’s voter restriction bill.

The president has predicated his support for any legislative effort on the SAVE Act’s passage. Since the beginning of the year, Trump has insisted it should be Congress’s top priority. He has refused to sign any bill and even derailed Cabinet confirmations until Capitol Hill bends to his will. So far, that stalemate has gummed up efforts to fund the Department of Homeland Security, stalled attempts to pass the National Defense Authorization Act, and upended a planned photo op of Trump signing a landmark bipartisan housing bill.

The original iteration of the SAVE America Act sparked nationwide backlash for proposing numerous amendments to the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, perhaps chief among them a requirement that voters bring either a passport or birth certificate to register to vote. Critics argued that the mandate would unduly restrict millions of Americans from voting, pointing out that half of the country’s population lacks a passport, and furthermore that the legislation as written would make it difficult for anyone who changed their name—including married women—to register.

The bill would also require voters to present photo identification when casting a ballot, and impose a total ban on mail-in voting. Trump has described the latter procedure as “crooked” and “corrupt,” despite the fact that he himself has cast several mail-in ballots.

At a rally in Georgia Wednesday, President Trump singled out a group of his supporters who consistently attend his speeches and sit in the front row, known as the “Front Row Joes.” 

“I don’t know what the hell they do, I think they make a lot of money, too. I’m hearing they’re very rich,” Trump said. 

The reality for these supporters is quite different, though, as Trisha Hope, a former Trump supporter and Front Row Joe, explained in a long X post. 

“Trump WRONGLY says to them ‘you’ve made a lot of money, you’re rich,’” Hope said. “This shows me how absolutely clueless he is on what these folks have sacrificed in order to support him. They DO NOT MAKE MONEY!!  In fact it costs them a GREAT deal of money and time to attend.”

Hope, who said she left the group last year over Trump’s comments about Jeffrey Epstein, added that the Front Roe Joes are “incredibly loyal and are deserving of much more than they have been given by Trump.”

“They drive sometimes all night to get in line [at rallies], they spend money on flights when driving isn’t an option,” Hope’s post continued. “They sleep outside the venue sometimes for days often sleeping on pop up cots or just a pallet on the ground. They rely on whatever facilities they can find to relieve themselves.”

Hope pointed out that the founder of the Joes, a Marine veteran named Randall Thom, was killed in a car accident driving home from a Trump rally on October 18, 2020, and “never got any recognition from the Trump crew, he had hoped to get a job with the rally team but he could never get them to commit to him.”

“I just couldn’t remain silent when I heard Trump talk as if the Front Row Joe’s are profiting from their rally attendance, it is the exact opposite,” Hope concluded.

All of this makes Trump’s comments on how wealthy the group must be seem incredibly callous and clueless. While he praised the Joes, who came decked out in matching red, white, and blue Trump sports jerseys, he doesn’t seem to know much about them, or care to know.

It looks like President Donald Trump’s sweeping construction projects have damaged yet another national monument.

A fountain in the German-American Friendship Garden on the National Mall is in bad shape after a contractor vehicle drove over it, Newsweek reported Thursday.

The center of the fountain has collapsed into the ground, and stones surrounding it were severely cracked, according to recent photographs captured by photojournalist Andrew Leyden. Repairs are reportedly underway.

This recent damage to a national monument comes amid Trump’s sweeping renovation efforts around Washington, D.C. This isn’t the first time that federal contractors hired by the Trump administration have damaged a historic landmark.

Just a few hundred yards away from the cracked fountain, renovations on the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool have been disastrous. Shortly after construction was completed, large sections of the pool’s new blue lining began to peel off. Experts have suggested the peeling was the result of shoddy application—not shadowy vandals, as administration officials have suggested. 

Trump’s disastrous renovations on the Reflecting Pool have already cost taxpayers more than $16 million. The iconic monument has been left drained, surrounded by chain-link fences, and under strict surveillance. 

A short walk away, the $69 million worth of renovations on the Lincoln Memorial Undercroft have also had issues. The National Parks Service has struggled to maintain safe conditions to display historical documents, leading them to be removed from the brand-new exhibit last week.  

Newly minted Senator Darline Graham, stepping in for her recently deceased brother Lindsey, only has one political donation on record—and it was to a South Carolina state senator who helped kill an abortion ban. 

The Daily Beast reported on Tuesday that Graham in 2020 donated $100 to state Senator Katrina Shealy, who is perhaps best known for filibustering the state’s near-total abortion ban in 2023. 

Shealy was part of South Carolina’s “sister senators,” a group of five female state lawmakers—two Republicans, a Democrat, and an independent— who were in staunch opposition to the ban. Shealy lost her primary the next year, largely due to this vote. 

Graham tried to bury the news of her ties to Shealy, writing in a statement on X on Wednesday that she believed in “protecting the sanctity of human life at every stage.”

“For years, I’ve committed my life to fighting for vulnerable populations, and no one is more vulnerable than an unborn child who cannot speak for themselves,” she wrote. “As a mother, I know that welcoming children into this world is God’s greatest gift. I’m proud to be pro-life and to stand up for the unborn and expecting moms. I will not waver in my support for life, pregnant women, and families.”

The MAGA-verse doesn’t seem to buy it. 

“Darline Graham Nordone is good friends with Katrina Shealy, the disgraced former South Carolina state senator who is PRO-ABORTION and OPPOSED the Heartbeat bill,” one conservative X account commented. “Darline even donated money to her campaign.”

“I’m going to ask @LIFEforSC to not consider her for the coveted ‘incumbent endorsement.’ She is fully unproven. She backed pro-abortion Senator Katrina Shealy. Vote @RalphNorman,” said another, referring to the representative who announced last week that he’d be running for Lindsey Graham’s seat in the August 11 special election. 

“You donated to Healy who is pro abortion and was against the heartbeat bill.  So either you are NOT pro life or you dont know who you are supporting,” wrote yet another. “Both are disqualifying.”

Graham has not fully explained her donation to Shealy. PBS reported that the two women are in fact good friends and often share wine on each other’s porches. 

And while Graham cast herself as a hard-line conservative in the same mold as her brother, this recent revelation may lead to more problems for her in the future as she runs for her own six-year term after finishing his current one. 

Four Republicans joined every Democrat in the House of Representatives Thursday to pass a war powers resolution to rein in President Trump on the Iran war. 

The resolution passed 214-208, with Republican Representatives Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Warren Davidson of Ohio, and Tom Barrett of Michigan voting yes. 

It joins a concurrent resolution in the Senate proposed by Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen on Thursday which would block Trump from military action in Iran without congressional approval. Van Hollen’s resolution only needs a simple majority to pass in the Senate, which could be likely with Republican absences, such as Mitch McConnell, who has been hospitalized for over a month. 

The resolutions have heightened importance due to the reignition of hostilities with Iran in recent weeks, with the U.S. resuming airstrikes against the country while Iran launches missiles at oil refineries and U.S. military targets around the Middle East. On Thursday, Trump threatened to expand the war to Yemen after the country’s Houthi militia began carrying out attacks in the Red Sea. 

This is the second time the House has passed a war powers resolution, following a June 3 vote where the same four Republican representatives joined Democrats to curtail the Iran war. The Senate joined them three weeks later, but then reversed its vote following pressure from Donald Trump.   

Will the Senate join the House in trying to rein in Trump, or will they allow more civilian deaths and economic damage from the renewed war? 

This story has been updated.