by Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell
Senate Majority Leader John Thune encouraged Senators to stop talking about President Donald Trump’s stated priority of nuking the filibuster, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
After a few moderates at the Senate’s Wednesday steering lunch urged the Republican conference not to talk about nuking the filibuster, Thune agreed that the move lacks the necessary support in the current conference, the sources said.
Thune clearly seemed to agree with the members asking their colleagues to stop discussing it, the sources said.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly demanded that Republicans eliminate the filibuster to require only a simple majority vote to pass key agenda items, instead of needing the customary 60 votes to end debate. His agenda includes the SAVE America Act, which would require proof of citizenship to register to vote and photo ID to vote in federal elections, as well as funding for the Department of Homeland Security.
Some in the Republican caucus remain firmly opposed to eliminating the filibuster, while others are warming up to the idea.
“By ending the filibuster now, Republicans could pass important legislation that the public overwhelmingly supports, but Democrats oppose,” Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., wrote in The Wall Steet Journal in March.
“My fellow conservatives and I have proudly used the 60-vote threshold to protect the country from all sorts of bad ideas and dangerous policies,” Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, wrote in a March 11 opinion article for the New York Post. “But when the reality on the ground changes, leaders must take stock and adapt.”
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, said he has “seen enough” and is ready to abolish the filibuster.
“I have seen enough, and heard enough excuses. We cannot let Democrats sabotage this country,” he said. “If nuking the filibuster is the only way to deliver on wildly popular legislation like the SAVE America Act, then we need to nuke the filibuster and start passing bills.”
But Thune has repeatedly said that there are not enough votes to eliminate the filibuster.
“Again, reality is, the votes aren’t there, and we can talk about the relative merits of the filibuster, or whether it’s relevant in the modern world,” Thune recently told reporters. “All those things are great conversations, but the practical reality is, the math isn’t there. It doesn’t add up, we don’t have the votes.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a longtime protégé and deputy of former Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, has long emphasized institutional guardrails and incremental legislative progress over sweeping procedural changes.
Thune rose through Senate Republican leadership ranks, serving as chairman of the Republican Policy Committee, chairman of the Republican Conference, and Republican whip before succeeding McConnell as leader following the 2024 elections. His record includes advancing major bipartisan measures such as the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, trade promotion authority legislation, and infrastructure projects like the Keystone XL pipeline authorization during periods of Republican Senate control, as well as more recent efforts on border security bills and targeted regulatory rollbacks.
Nonetheless, Trump insists that terminating the filibuster will yield key victories for Republicans.
“I say, end the filibuster,” Trump told The Daily Signal March 29. “Terminate the filibuster. Just vote, and you’ll get everything you want.”
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Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell is the White House correspondent for the Daily Signal. Executive Editor of The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network Christina Botteri contributed to this report.
Photo “Sen. John Thune” by Gage Skidmore CC2.0.
