Trump snarls GOP’s midterm message

House Republicans have spent months scrambling to unite around a midterm strategy that will keep them in the majority following November’s elections. In just the last two weeks, President Trump has made their task much tougher. On the messaging front, the president’s attacks on Iran have muddled his “America First” mantra and caused the price of gas to spike — with other staples expected to follow — undermining a promise to slash consumer costs that Republicans were hoping to take to voters in this year’s campaign. The massive price tag of the war has challenged Trump’s vow to shrink deficits, avoid foreign entanglements and dedicate taxpayer dollars to domestic problems. And on Capitol Hill, Trump is newly demanding that Congress pass tougher voting laws before he’ll sign anything else — an extraordinary challenge to his own party’s leaders that threatens to bring the GOP’s legislative plans to a screeching halt heading into the midterms. The combination is posing new headaches for Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and his leadership team, who were already struggling to unite a fractious conference behind a midterm strategy in a tough cycle when a record number of GOP incumbents are abandoning their seats. Those tensions were all on display last week during the Republicans’ annual issues conference, held at Trump’s golf resort in Doral, Fla., where lawmakers gathered to hash out a legislative blueprint for the coming months. Before the event could begin, Trump threw a wrench in those talks by threatening to withhold his signature from any legislation until Congress sends tougher voting rules to his desk — a message he amplified on the first night of the gathering. “The people are demanding it,” Trump told Republicans at Doral. “Every time I go out, save America! Save America! We want the SAVE America Act! That’s all they talk about. They don’t talk about housing. They don’t talk about anything. That’s what they talk about. And if you send it up there, you will win the midterms and you will win every election for a long time.” The House has already passed the bill. And Johnson downplayed the significance of Trump’s ultimatum, noting in a fireside chat with NBC News during the retreat that, under the Constitution, a bill automatically becomes law if the president doesn’t sign it within ten days while Congress is in session. (Trump did not extend his threat to vetoing bills). Johnson is also confident that the tax cuts and other benefits of Trump’s “big beautiful bill” will bring voters to their side in November. “I am absolutely convinced we are going to win the midterms and grow the majority,” Johnson told Michael Knowles, a conservative commenter, at the retreat. Still, the president’s demand for a national voter ID is roiling Republicans in the Senate, inviting divisive fights over the future of the filibuster. And it’s threatening to derail, or at least delay, action on countless other bills GOP leaders are hoping to move this year — including a housing package designed to lower consumer costs — as some House Republicans are backing Trump’s demand with ultimatums of their own. “I’ll be voting ‘no’ on all Senate bills — other than DHS funding — until the Senate passes the SAVE America Act,” Rep. Brandon Gill (R-Texas) wrote Friday on X. The spike in gas costs poses an even greater challenge. Since Trump joined Israel in launching strikes against Iran on Feb. 28, the price at the pump has jumped drastically, caused largely by Iran’s threats to oil and gas tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. On Friday, the average cost was $3.63 per gallon, according to AAA, up from $2.94 a month earlier. Republicans have dismissed the hike as a temporary inconvenience — one that’s worth the cost to dismantle Iran’s military powers and nuclear capabilities. “If that means prices go up for a time, I think Americans understand, we can live with that,” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) told CNN’s Kasie Hunt on Thursday. Still, voters tend to be driven by economic anxiety above all other factors. And Trump, who had successfully pinned the blame for rising egg costs on President Biden, is showing little of the same concerns now that gas prices are increasing on his watch. “The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money,” Trump posted Thursday on Truth Social. Other Republicans are sounding alarms, warning that a prolonged disruption of oil markets resulting from the Iran conflict will haunt Republicans when voters go to the polls in November. “Hopefully, this is in the rearview mirror,” Sean Spicer, who served as press secretary in Trump’s first term, told NewsNation’s Chris Cuomo on Thursday. “But if we’re getting into summer travel season, and people are saying it’s costing me twice as much to fill up the car or I’m driving Uber to make ends meet and it’s not even yielding anything for me, that’s going to spell trouble.” Complicating the Republicans’ midterm strategy, House GOP leadership is intent on pursuing a second reconciliation bill — a heavy lift for Johnson as he navigates a razor-thin majority. That obscure process allows the majority party to pass strictly partisan bills by sidestepping the Senate filibuster — the strategy GOP leaders used last year to pass Trump’s “big beautiful bill” — and many Republicans don’t want to skip the opportunity to add on to their legislative accomplishments while they still control all levers of power in Washington. “Our number one objective for the remainder of the year — top priority — is to continue to work with President Trump and the administration to reduce the cost of living for hardworking American families,” Johnson said. “And there’s many things that we — several things we can do — in reconciliation to achieve that objective.” The Republican Study Committee, the largest caucus of conservatives in the House, unveiled a framework for a reconciliation bill earlier this year that includes a rollback of regulations governing energy production, policies to boost access to homeownership and health reforms that would redirect ObamaCare subsidies to individuals rather than insurance companies. House Budget Committee Chair Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), a chief architect of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, told reporters he envisions a second reconciliation bill also focusing on “fraud prevention” and “bigger investments in defense, whether that’s to shore up resources for the current conflict with Iran, or more capital investment to modernize and re tool the military.” “Reconciliation may be the last train that’s leaving the station for a very — I think the most important issue, quite frankly,” Arrington said. “I mean, we need to help on affordability. We need to root out fraud and waste and you know, but we’re in conflict where our guys, our sons and daughters, need us to stand with them, and so I can’t think of a higher moral calling right now than that.” Others, however, have strong reservations. “I’ve said since November of 2024, that we needed to pass one big beautiful bill, because I felt like that was the best way that we could leverage in order to deliver on the president’s campaign promises such as no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, tax relief for seniors. And if you look at history, it is extremely rare for two partisan reconciliation bills to ever pass in the same Congress — extremely rare,” Rep. Jason Smith (R-Mo.), chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, told reporters at the retreat. “So I would absolutely love a second reconciliation bill — I would love that,” he added. “But I just don’t think it will ever happen.”