As President Donald Trump’s controversial voter identification bill continues to stall in the Senate, the president took to social media Sunday to promote an op-ed from a conservative outlet hammering GOP leadership for "sloth."
Trump’s proposed bill, the SAVE Act, would require all Americans to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote, a mandate that could pose challenges for countless eligible voters and has been described by some critics as a form of “voter suppression.”
Trump has made the SAVE Act his top priority in recent months, going as far as to derail the Senate GOP’s entire agenda with a surprise cancellation of a Senate confirmation hearing, and caused further chaos by refusing to sign a bi-partisan bill on affordable housing.
And on Sunday, Trump promoted an op-ed published last week by the Daily Signal, an op-ed in which columnist and Fox News contributor Deroy Murdock torched Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) for lacking “true grit.”
“The GOP Senate needs such true grit. Alas, John Thune offers talcum powder,” Murdock wrote in the op-ed promoted by Trump. “Thune is like a regional sales manager who moans to headquarters, ‘I don’t have any sales.’ Well, kid, go close some sales! If SAVE lacks the votes, get the votes!”
According to a recent analysis from New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie, Senate Republicans may only now be “coming to understand” the threat Trump poses to their agenda. According to Bouie, however, that realization may already have come “a bit too late” to save the GOP from a sizable loss in the upcoming midterm elections.