Presidential legacies are built on legislation, not executive orders – a lesson from Donald Trump’s first term that now presents a pressing test for his second.
For years, Trump has relied on sheer force to pressure Republicans into doing as he pleased. For the most part, it’s worked: the party long ago fell into line, with skeptics cast into the wilderness. Yet even with a GOP now aligned almost entirely behind him, Trump is still finding there are limits to the power of his bully pulpit, even with the fate of nearly his entire domestic agenda in the balance.
The president visited Capitol Hill Tuesday morning in hopes of convincing holdout Republicans to align behind his “big beautiful” budget bill, but many skeptics remained unconvinced after an hour-long meeting that Trump described as a “pep rally.”
In fact, the rifts between moderate and ultraconservative factions of the party only seemed to deepen, without a clear pathway to success for a bill that could come to define Trump’s legacy.
“I don’t think he convinced enough people that the bill is adequate the way it is,” Maryland Rep. Andy Harris, chair of the House Freedom Caucus, said afterward. Harris’ ultraconservative group has pressed for deeper spending cuts, particularly to Medicaid, as a way to counter the bill’s expansion of the federal deficit.
White House officials believe passage of the bill is vital if Trump is to deliver on his campaign promises of tightening border security, extending his first term tax cuts and eliminating taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security. Both advisers and lawmakers believe they have a narrow window for success ahead of next year’s midterm elections.
With the economy locked in a state of uncertainty due to Trump’s trade war, the package represents what White House officials believe is their best chance to spur growth and improve Americans’ views of the country’s financial state. Moody’s recent decision to downgrade the US credit rating only heightens the urgency of the legislation.
Trump’s message heading into Tuesday’s closed-door session was not particularly subtle. Republicans who oppose his bill “wouldn’t be a Republican much longer,” he said as he arrived at the Capitol. “They would be knocked out so fast.” He even called out Rep. Thomas Massie, who has promised to oppose the bill, several times before and during the Republican meeting.
But even the threat of a primary challenge was not enough to sway the resistors.
“It’s math, is what it is,” Massie said. “If this vote were based on intuition or likability of the president, I might vote yes. But it’s not. Not for me. There are real consequences.”
Four months into his term, Trump has signed hundreds of executive actions and repeatedly tested the bounds of his presidential authority. But he’s signed only a handful of bills into law — and only two of those warranted major signing ceremonies at the White House. One of them, a measure he signed Monday cracking down on revenge porn, passed with overwhelming bipartisan support.
The bill he tried to sell on Capitol Hill Tuesday is an altogether different animal, with a far less certain future. Republicans must pass it on party lines, and they can’t afford to lose more than two votes on the House floor, assuming no absences. Currently, Speaker Mike Johnson doesn’t have the necessary support.
And negotiating in either direction risks further alienating the other side — while conservatives are seeking deeper cuts, moderates worry about the politics of stripping away health coverage from vulnerable Americans. Still others want a bigger deduction for state and local taxes, which Trump once supported before making clear Tuesday that he did not want so-called SALT provisions to hold up his prized bill.
“Quit talking about SALT,” one Republican quoted Trump as saying during the meeting. “Don’t ask for any more.”
For a president eager to make a more permanent mark than executive orders, which a successor can quickly overturn, the battle over his budget has become his most difficult test yet — exposing deep divides in the GOP-controlled government.
They are not necessarily divisions the president has been eager to repair. From his perspective, the bill already contains everything he promised as a candidate. The ensuing debate among Republicans over exploding deficits or cuts to Medicaid is a byproduct of his campaign pledges, but is not itself something the president had vowed to resolve.
And while Trump declared himself the biggest “fiscal hawk” of all ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, he also appears wary of becoming the face of deep cuts to government health or food assistance programs. He told Republicans Tuesday not to “f**k” with Medicaid as part of the haggling to get the bill over the finish line.
For Trump, branding is king. By wrapping his entire domestic agenda into one piece of legislation under the title ‘One Big Beautiful Bill Act,’ the president was putting nearly all his eggs into one basket. And failure is not an option entertained by the White House.
For all of Trump’s travels of late, including a Middle East trip last week where he received opulent welcomes and announced deals in three Gulf capitals, his jaunt up Pennsylvania Avenue on Tuesday might be his most important trip of all.
“There are some people who want a couple of things that maybe I don’t like or that they’re not going to get,” Trump said, sending a message to his fellow Republicans that standing in the way of the bill would be neither allowed nor forgiven.
One of the biggest legislative accomplishments from his first time in office was the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which Trump signed into law on Dec. 22, 2017. It came as an early Christmas present that put a bow on a rough first year in office
And it included an expiration date that is soon due.
As summer dawns, Trump is at a critical juncture of his presidency. Since taking office, he has been well aware that the clock is ticking. Even if House Republicans manage to overcome objections and pass the bill, senators are expected to make significant changes to clear it through their chamber. That would mean another jaunt through the fractious House — and potentially weeks of further negotiations.
“He knows that this year will shape his presidency,” a senior Trump adviser told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations with the president. “This is the best chance to deliver on his promises.”
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