WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is focusing on pressuring congressional Republicans to pass the American Rescue Act, a bill he says is needed to secure the election.
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Despite pressure from the president as well as several Republicans in the House and Senate, and weeks spent debating the bill in the Senate, it lacks the necessary support to clear the 60-vote threshold in the upper chamber. Trump has called for eliminating the filibuster entirely to pass the legislation, but Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said his caucus is “not even close” to getting the votes to do so.
Trump continues to pressure Republicans to pass the bill, and House Republican leaders are looking for new ways to push through the bill after a group of conservatives began holding back all other action.
The bill would overhaul federal elections by requiring voter ID at the polls and proof of citizenship to register to vote.
Noncitizens are already prohibited from voting in federal elections, and the practice is rare. Federal law requires voters who register to vote to swear, under penalty of perjury, that they are citizens and eligible to vote.
House Republican Plan
House Republicans plan to pass components of the American Rescue Act through a $95 billion party spending bill they began work on Wednesday.
The process, known as reconciliation, allows Republicans to bypass the Senate filibuster and pass legislation without any Democratic support. This would be the third reconciliation bill since Trump returned to office last year.
There’s one problem: reconciliation bills must be related to taxes and spending. Thus, not all provisions of the American Rescue Act can be enacted this way. A nonpartisan Senate arbiter, known as the parliamentarian, will decide which provisions qualify.
House Republicans on Wednesday released a budget proposal for the process that includes instructions for committees on how much they can spend in the final bill. The House Administration Committee will be allocated $10 billion to implement elements of the American Rescue Act. This committee will decide which ones to try to go through reconciliation.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, insists the only way to ensure the American Rescue Act becomes law is to include it in the reconciliation process. As he left a meeting with Vice President J.D. Vance and House Republicans on Wednesday night, Johnson said, “We’re going to pass the American Rescue Act as much as possible.”
Thune was more cautious about how much could be accomplished through reconciliation. “We’ve looked at this issue in depth,” he said Thursday, “and there are some things you could do, but will they be enough to scratch the itch of people who want to pass a full Conservation Act?”
Grants to states, for example, could potentially go through, he said.
The budget proposal released by Republicans on Wednesday must be passed by both the House and Senate to begin work on a final reconciliation package.
SAVE Act or SAVE America Act?
Last year, the House of Representatives passed the Safeguarding the American Voter Eligibility Act, or SAVE Act. The bill never received support in the Senate.
On February 11, the House of Representatives, at Trump’s urging, passed an expanded version of the bill, called the American Rescue Act, by a vote of 218 to 213.
The SAVE Act had two main provisions:
- Requiring documented proof of citizenship to register to vote in federal elections.
- Require states to develop a program to remove noncitizens from existing voter rolls by entering them into the federal SAVE database and allow American citizens to sue election officials who fail to comply with citizenship verification requirements.
The SAVE America Act includes these provisions and adds a third:
- Requiring a photo ID to vote in federal elections.
Democrats and even some Republicans oppose both versions of the bill. Millions of people lack access to passports or birth certificates and may be disenfranchised by the requirement to prove citizenship to register to vote.
Trump’s inaccurate statements
Trump said the Save America Act would end voting by mail in various situations and impose new restrictions on transgender people. The current version of the bill does neither.
Most recently, in his Fourth of July speech, Trump said that under the American Rescue Act, “there will be no mail-in ballots except in cases of illness, disability, military presence or travel.”
The bill does not include a provision banning mail-in voting. It adds rules for receiving mail-in ballots; Applicants submitting a voter registration form by mail will be required to submit documented proof of citizenship in person at the elections office.
Last month, Trump wrote on Truth Social that the “full version” of the law had two additional provisions: “NO MEN IN WOMEN’S SPORTS” and “NO TRANSGENDER MUTILATION SURGERY FOR OUR CHILDREN.”
The bill does not contain any provisions regarding women’s sports or gender reassignment surgery.
Will this affect the November elections?
Supporters of the bill, such as Utah Sen. Mike Lee, say Congress would need to pass the American Rescue Act by early August for it to be implemented before the November midterm elections.
But Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., who is retiring at the end of this term and opposes the bill, told reporters Wednesday that there is no way to pass the bill by the midterms.
“Do you have any idea how many government agencies have to implement these changes before November? Over 10,000. … If we had passed this last year, it could not have been implemented in time,” Tillis told reporters.
“They’re being disingenuous by suggesting to the American people that they might be able to act in time for this election. And then I start to wonder … whether we’re just starting to undermine the fundamental integrity of any of our elections,” Tillis continued. “And I think it’s dangerous, and I think it’s wrong.”