GOP hardliners lift U.S. House blockade, challenges remain

By Thérèse Boudreaux
The Center Square

A group of Republican hardliners in the U.S. House finally lifted its blockade of the floor, allowing a critical national security funding bill to advance Tuesday.

The band, led by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., has demanded for weeks that House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., somehow force the Senate to pass Republicans’ SAVE America Act by attaching it to must-pass bills like the National Defense Authorization Act.

After previous attempts to appease them, Johnson finally set up a rule to advance the fiscal year 2027 National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs Appropriations Act.

The approved rule provides that if the National Security-State bill passes the House – which it likely will this week, given Republicans’ majority – the SAVE America Act will be attached to the bill and sent as one package to the Senate for a vote.

Given universal Democratic opposition and the upper chamber’s 60-vote passage threshold, however, Johnson’s tactic will almost certainly result in the legislation bombing in the Senate.

Democrats have dubbed the SAVE America Act a “voter suppression bill,” arguing that instances of illegal voting are rare and that stronger proof of citizenship requirements can disenfranchise rural and low-income Americans.

The legislation would require people to show proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections, require voters to show photo ID when casting a ballot in a federal election, and mandate states to remove noncitizens from voter rolls.

Merging it with critical bills likely won’t persuade Senate Democrats to fold. Despite the urgency of completing the annual government funding process by Sept. 30, Democrats in the 119th Congress have twice shown they are willing to let the federal government shut down if funding it conflicts with political priorities.

Yet Luna and the Republican group are expecting Johnson to try the same thing with other critical bills, doubling down on passing the voter ID legislation by any means necessary.

The lawmakers had only agreed to pass the rule Tuesday “on the condition that Speaker Johnson attaches the SAVE America Act to all the appropriation bills and all must-pass bills here in the House and ensures it is sent to the Senate as one bill.”

“If [Senate Majority Leader] John Thune strips it out in the Senate that will be on him and the entire country should be watching what he does,” Luna warned.

House lawmakers have also made minimal progress on the 12 annual appropriations bills to fund the federal government in fiscal year 2027, which begins Oct. 1.

Only two of those bills have passed the lower chamber and none have advanced in the Senate, making it highly likely that Congress will have to pass a Continuing Resolution temporarily freezing federal funding at current levels. Otherwise, they risk a third government shutdown.