Reporter's Notebook: Trump's SAVE Act ultimatum runs into Senate reality

By Fox News · Fox News

Passage of the SAVE America Act is of paramount importance to President Donald Trump and many congressional Republicans. In his State of the Union speech, the president implored lawmakers "to approve the SAVE America Act to stop illegal aliens and other unpermitted persons from voting in our sacred American elections." The House approved the plan to require proof of citizenship to vote last month, 218-213. There’s now a different version of the legislation that’s in play. And, as is often the case, the hurdle is the Senate. Specifically, the Senate filibuster. So some Republicans are trying to save the SAVE America Act. It’s important to note that Trump never called for the Senate to alter the filibuster in his State of the Union address. But in a post last week on Truth Social, Trump declared, "The Republicans MUST DO, with PASSION, and at the expense of everything else, THE SAVE AMERICA ACT." Again, the president didn’t wade into questions about overcoming a filibuster. But "MUST DO" and "at the expense of everything else" is a clear directive from the commander in chief. That’s why there’s a big push by House Republicans and some GOP senators to alter the filibuster — or handle the Senate filibuster differently. It’s rare for members of one body of Congress to tell the other how to execute their rules and procedures. But the strongest conservative advocates of the SAVE America Act are now condemning Senate Republicans if they don’t do something drastic to change the filibuster to pass the measure. Some Senate Republicans are pushing for changes, or at the very least, advocating that Senate Republicans insist that Democrats conduct what they refer to as a "talking filibuster" and not hold up the legislation from the sidelines. It takes 60 votes to terminate a filibuster. The Senate does that by "invoking cloture." The Senate first used the cloture provision to halt a filibuster on March 8, 1917. Prior to that vote, the only method to end a filibuster was exhausti…