Trump wants SAVE Act in third megabill, but even supporters aren’t convinced

President Donald Trump wants Republicans to include his long-sought voter ID and citizenship verification bill in his party package, but even the bill’s strongest supporters don’t think it’s possible.

Trump last week demanded that Republicans work on a third budget reconciliation package, packing $350 billion in defense spending and the Saving America Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act into a single bill.

Republicans who approved the second compromise package to fund immigration enforcement for the remainder of the Trump term have been at best indifferent to redoing the process, especially with so little time until the fast-approaching midterm elections.

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But some see compromise, which would leave Democrats out of the process entirely, as the only way to pass the SAVE America Act.

“This is our only chance. This is our only chance,” said Sen. John Kennedy, R-La. “I don’t think we have enough time. We’ve wasted too much time and I’m not sure we can agree on things to put in it. Not everyone is as easy to get along with as I am.”

The problems facing the legislation are twofold. Senate Democrats have vowed to block the legislation, meaning any hope of reaching the 60-vote filibuster threshold is impossible, and not every Republican supports the bill.

“I support voter ID and support voting only for American citizens, but Democrats are implacably opposed to it and we don’t have enough Republicans to fill the gap,” said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. “So instead of fighting with each other, we should focus on winning the midterms.”

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Republicans have tried and failed to pass the bill several times, even launching a mid-level takeover earlier this year to push the issue into debate.

Still, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R.S.D.) acknowledged that “we don’t have the right to vote.”

“Even if you narrow it down to just two issues, like photo ID and citizenship, you still get 60 votes in the Senate to register to vote on those two issues,” Thune said. “The only way to get here is to roll back or eliminate the legislative filibuster, and we don’t have anywhere near the votes needed here in the United States Senate to achieve that.”

Trying to put the bill into a compromise package that could be passed by a simple majority vote has its own problems beyond vote counting.

The process is generally governed by the Byrd Rule, which states that any item in the compromise must have a direct budget impact and cannot be pure policy. If a provision is accepted as policy, the 60-vote threshold comes into play.

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Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, is leading efforts to pass the Senate passage of the SAVE America Act, which would federally mandate voter ID nationwide. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Republicans, including Kennedy, tried three separate times to include the SAVE America Act (or versions of it) in the most recent compromise package. All three achieved 60 votes, and all but one failed to achieve 50 votes.

Sen. Jon Husted, R-Ohio, is one of the biggest supporters of the SAVE America Act in the upper chamber and said he is “looking for every way possible to get the SAVE America Act passed.”

“And we’re working on some options right now that would meet the standard of being part of the reconciliation process,” Husted said. “But I’m not at all sure we’ll make it, but we’ve got to try.”

These alternatives would likely be quite different from the current bill; Trump has already asked Republicans to renew policies to include policies unrelated to elections, such as banning biological males from participating in women’s sports.

President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on June 10, 2026. (Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP)

Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, the main pusher of the SAVE America Act in the Senate, acknowledged that the bill “is policy and off-budget. Therefore, SAVE America itself is not eligible for consideration in a third compromise.”

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But he said one plausible way to get at least some of the bill through the Byrd Rule would be to fund states to issue an “Enhanced Real ID” showing proof of citizenship.

Lawmakers could then pass a separate bill, outside of reconciliation, that would require proof of identity to vote in federal elections. But Lee, like many in the Senate GOP, was skeptical that a third reconciliation bill might even be an option.

“The second reason is that, from a practical standpoint, I see no evidence that there is a viable path to a third compromise bill,” Lee said. “I hope there is. I’d love to be wrong about that. I want us to do it. I think we should. But the program we have, to my great disappointment, doesn’t fit any of that.”