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DORAL, Fla. — House Republicans gave President Donald Trump one of their loudest rounds of applause Monday night as he declared to them that the war in Iran would be a “short-term excursion.”
He then implied it might not be so short.
Trump told GOP lawmakers that “we will not relent until the enemy is totally and decisively defeated,” only to later tell reporters that US military objectives in Iran “are pretty well complete.”
It’s a roller-coaster of a timetable for an operation in Iran that, as recently as last week, administration officials were openly projecting would last five weeks or longer. Republicans were hoping for clarity as they prepare to discuss the remainder of this year’s Hill agenda at their annual policy retreat at Trump National.
Instead, Trump focused more on his shifting objectives on Iran than on his party’s limited domestic agenda. His “biggest plea” to his House allies on Monday night was to pass sweeping legislation adding new ID requirements for voters, which has already passed their chamber but stalled in the Senate.
Trump told Speaker Mike Johnson and House GOP leaders to take up a new version of the bill with additional restrictions on surgeries for transgender minors and mail voting.
“It will guarantee the midterms. If you don’t get it, big trouble,” he said of the bill — whose future is largely out of House Republicans’ hands. Even if a new version manages to clear the narrowly divided House, it would still face an uphill climb in the Senate.
Meanwhile, House Republican leaders are trying to use their retreat to sketch out the next phase of their legislative plan, with little room for error.
In closed-door sessions, they’re strategizing about what many senior Republicans think will be an attempt to pass a second filibuster-skirting megabill before a midterm election that could hand congressional control to Democrats.
Such a bill could end up including a long list of other priorities, including an expected Trump administration request to fund the war in Iran, or even a provision allowing year-round sales of ethanol (a top goal for farm-state members).
But Republicans will likely struggle to get a so-called reconciliation bill through the Senate, let alone the House, as purple-district lawmakers remain wary of taking tough votes in an election year.
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Nicholas Wu’s view
If Hill Republicans came to Doral looking for answers from the president on what to do with the rest of this year, they got somewhat of a muddle. As spiking oil prices drive concerns among some in the party that the Iran war could distract from the more marketable elements of the president’s domestic agenda, Trump tried to focus instead on red-meat issues like the voting bill.
And although he talked up the tax cuts Republican lawmakers enacted in last year’s megabill, a party-line sequel was absent from his remarks.
Still, GOP leaders are projecting confidence. Opening the room for Trump, Republican Conference Chair Lisa McClain of Michigan said the party could buck the recent tradition of parties in power losing seats in a midterm year.
“Everyone in this room knows what’s at stake in November. History will tell us the party in the majority is supposed to lose seats. History tells us that momentum shifts. But I don’t know about you: history’s been wrong a lot this year,” she said.
Room for Disagreement
It’s not all doom and gloom in the Senate over another party-line bill this year. Some conservatives are openly entertaining an effort to pass the voting and citizenship bill as part of a reconciliation package — although they acknowledge that the chamber’s strict rules might make that impossible.
“I’m not aware of any means by which it could pass through reconciliation,” said Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah. “If there is, I’m all ears.”
Notable
- Trump over the weekend threatened to withhold his signature from all other bills until the voting legislation makes it through, though as our Burgess Everett notes, that doesn’t mean laws can’t get made.