Sir Richard Spirit
Superstar
This is kinda early to say but 
Hours after witnessing his party’s worst electoral drubbing in at least six years, President Donald Trump hosted Senate Republicans at the White House and demanded they ditch their chamber’s supermajority rules.
“If you don’t terminate the filibuster, you’ll be in bad shape,” he told them over breakfast in the State Dining Room.
It was classic Trump dominance theater, like many other occasions this year where he successfully muscled recalcitrant Republicans to confirm controversial nominees, support divisive policies and enact sweeping domestic policy legislation.
But upon returning to the Capitol, the senators made it very clear: They planned to blow Trump off. One GOP senator, Mike Rounds of South Dakota, laughed out loud when asked about the anti-filibuster push.
Welcome to the dawn of Trump’s lame duck era.
Don’t expect an immediate stampede away from the president, according to interviews with GOP lawmakers and aides Wednesday — he remains overwhelmingly popular with GOP voters and is the party’s most dominant leader in a generation. Trump’s top political aide signaled Monday that the White House is not worried about a messy “family conversation” about the filibuster.
But with Tuesday’s stunning election lossescrystallizing the risks to downballot Republicans in 2026 and beyond, there are growing signs that lawmakers are contending with the facts of their political lives: He’ll be gone in just over three years, while they’ll still be around.
The danger for the president is that if Trump can’t run roughshod over the thin GOP congressional majorities, it would leave him few legislative options given his scant interest in compromising with Democrats.
One Republican already liberated from reelection concerns openly vocalized frustrations Wednesday as Trump pushed for the end of the filibuster — something many in the GOP fear would backfire soon enough once Democrats regain power.
Retiring Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) called Democrats’ victory margins Tuesday “a red flag to the GOP” and blasted Trump’s refusal to engage with the other party.
“He has zero ability to work across the aisle,” he added. “He needs to face reality and learn how to talk to Democrats he can reason with.”
Other House Republicans more quietly aired frustration with Trump’s approach to the record 37-day shutdown, which headed into the end of the congressional workweek with no clear end in sight.
Many are privately signaling they’re prepared to break with Trump if he doesn’t allow Republicans to negotiate on an extension of the Obamacare insurance subsidies Democrats are demanding.
Others blamed the president and his top budget aide, Russ Vought, for favoring hardball moves such as canceling blue-state transportation projects and firing federal employees that only served to cause Democrats to dig in further.
One irate senior House Republican granted anonymity to speak candidly blamed Trump and Vought for spurring the shutdown with their unprecedented move to unilaterally rescind congressional funding over the summer through a so-called pocket rescission.
“That decision is why we’re in this mess,” the Republican said.
Article is longer but it’s free
Hours after witnessing his party’s worst electoral drubbing in at least six years, President Donald Trump hosted Senate Republicans at the White House and demanded they ditch their chamber’s supermajority rules.
“If you don’t terminate the filibuster, you’ll be in bad shape,” he told them over breakfast in the State Dining Room.
It was classic Trump dominance theater, like many other occasions this year where he successfully muscled recalcitrant Republicans to confirm controversial nominees, support divisive policies and enact sweeping domestic policy legislation.
But upon returning to the Capitol, the senators made it very clear: They planned to blow Trump off. One GOP senator, Mike Rounds of South Dakota, laughed out loud when asked about the anti-filibuster push.
Welcome to the dawn of Trump’s lame duck era.
Don’t expect an immediate stampede away from the president, according to interviews with GOP lawmakers and aides Wednesday — he remains overwhelmingly popular with GOP voters and is the party’s most dominant leader in a generation. Trump’s top political aide signaled Monday that the White House is not worried about a messy “family conversation” about the filibuster.
But with Tuesday’s stunning election lossescrystallizing the risks to downballot Republicans in 2026 and beyond, there are growing signs that lawmakers are contending with the facts of their political lives: He’ll be gone in just over three years, while they’ll still be around.
The danger for the president is that if Trump can’t run roughshod over the thin GOP congressional majorities, it would leave him few legislative options given his scant interest in compromising with Democrats.
One Republican already liberated from reelection concerns openly vocalized frustrations Wednesday as Trump pushed for the end of the filibuster — something many in the GOP fear would backfire soon enough once Democrats regain power.
Retiring Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) called Democrats’ victory margins Tuesday “a red flag to the GOP” and blasted Trump’s refusal to engage with the other party.
“He has zero ability to work across the aisle,” he added. “He needs to face reality and learn how to talk to Democrats he can reason with.”
Other House Republicans more quietly aired frustration with Trump’s approach to the record 37-day shutdown, which headed into the end of the congressional workweek with no clear end in sight.
Many are privately signaling they’re prepared to break with Trump if he doesn’t allow Republicans to negotiate on an extension of the Obamacare insurance subsidies Democrats are demanding.
Others blamed the president and his top budget aide, Russ Vought, for favoring hardball moves such as canceling blue-state transportation projects and firing federal employees that only served to cause Democrats to dig in further.
One irate senior House Republican granted anonymity to speak candidly blamed Trump and Vought for spurring the shutdown with their unprecedented move to unilaterally rescind congressional funding over the summer through a so-called pocket rescission.
“That decision is why we’re in this mess,” the Republican said.
Article is longer but it’s free
) the other bullshyt people are talking about out here. These people are going to have to acknowledge that they were doing better before Donald Trump was sworn in again.. it hasn’t even been a full year yet, imagine what shyt would look like in year three
One thing you don’t want people to do is lost hope and that seems like it’s spreading and going to hurt Trump and them if they’re not careful.
Title had me shook for a moment
