{"id":21878,"date":"2026-07-30T09:30:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T04:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=21878"},"modified":"2026-07-30T09:30:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T04:30:07","slug":"thune-trump-tensions-escalate-as-clock-ticks-on-megabill-3-0","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=21878","title":{"rendered":"Thune-Trump tensions escalate as clock ticks on megabill 3.0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/yHClMdqStPA2WSV1Yz_5LkyN0-w=\/0x0:8192x4608\/1366x768\/2026\/07\/29\/1785362430588.jpeg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Senate Majority Leader John Thune repeated to White House officials in private what he&#8217;s been saying in public for weeks: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/21\/congress-reconciliation-omb-iran-republicans\" target=\"_blank\">We don&#8217;t have the votes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why it matters:<\/strong> President Trump isn&#8217;t buying it \u2014 and he&#8217;s questioning whether Thune is the man for the job.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;Well, we&#8217;re gonna find out,&#8221; Trump said Wednesday. &#8220;I&#8217;ll let you know.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Asked Wednesday evening about Trump saying the votes were gettable, Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters, &#8220;That must be a different form of math.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Driving the news:<\/strong> Hours earlier, two of Trump&#8217;s top aides met with Senate Republicans at their weekly lunch to press them to pass a three-part budget reconciliation bill before leaving town, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/29\/trump-senate-republicans-maga-budget-bill\" target=\"_blank\">Axios scooped earlier Wednesday<\/a>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The goal is to move a House budget resolution to &#8220;pay our troops, help our farms and secure our elections,&#8221; a White House official told Axios.<\/li>\n<li>The White House is also floating a separate reconciliation package (a fourth) to raise the debt ceiling during the lame-duck session.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>What we&#8217;re hearing:<\/strong> Many of Thune&#8217;s members simply don&#8217;t want to endure another <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/06\/05\/senate-ice-border-patrol-funding-vote\" target=\"_blank\">vote-a-rama<\/a>, the marathon amendment process that comes with every reconciliation bill.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The White House wants Thune to expand the number of committees that receive reconciliation instructions.<\/li>\n<li>Many in Thune&#8217;s conference want to expand the bill in a different direction \u2014 and plus-up the $67 billion in defense spending that cleared the House.<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;There&#8217;s clearly an interest among certain members of our conference for a higher level of military and defense,&#8221; Thune said Wednesday.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The intrigue:<\/strong> During the meeting, Republicans pointed out that the election-law changes envisioned in the House version of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/03\/29\/save-act-voter-registration-distance-travel\" target=\"_blank\">SAVE Act <\/a>\u2014 including more money for states to enforce voter ID and proof-of-citizenship requirements \u2014 wouldn&#8217;t take effect in time to affect this November&#8217;s elections.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Zoom out:<\/strong> The public clash comes at an awkward moment for Republicans: Fourteen weeks before the midterms, the White House and Senate GOP leadership are openly sparring over the president&#8217;s agenda instead of selling it.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Trump is trying to increase pressure on Thune, but the majority leader still <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/27\/donald-trump-john-thune-senate-republicans-save-act\" target=\"_blank\">enjoys broad support within his conference<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>Thune, when asked about Trump questioning whether he&#8217;s the best person for the job, <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/andrewdesiderio\/status\/2082594162482757922?s=46\" target=\"_blank\">told reporters<\/a> Wednesday: &#8220;Well, that&#8217;s nice of him. I guess. I don&#8217;t know, what do you say on that? That&#8217;s a decision that&#8217;s made by my colleagues.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Even as the two are at odds over reconciliation, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/29\/republicans-midterm-convention-dallas-john-thune-mike-johnson-trump\" target=\"_blank\">Thune is planning to fly<\/a> to Dallas to join Trump at the president&#8217;s midterm political convention in September.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Senate Majority Leader John Thune repeated to White House officials in private what he&#8217;s been saying in public for weeks: We don&#8217;t have the votes. Why it matters: President Trump isn&#8217;t buying it \u2014 and he&#8217;s questioning whether Thune is the man for the job. &#8220;Well, we&#8217;re gonna find out,&#8221; Trump said Wednesday. &#8220;I&#8217;ll let&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21879,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/yHClMdqStPA2WSV1Yz_5LkyN0-w=\/0x0:8192x4608\/1366x768\/2026\/07\/29\/1785362430588.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}