The Trump administration wants to use the process of reconciliation to move the SAVE America Act through the Senate, new Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin said in response to a question from The Daily Signal.
“There’s a framework that we can do through reconciliation, paying for, putting some of the policies that cost money in, because there’s nothing more important than the SAVE America Act,” Mullin said at the White House on Tuesday, shortly after he was sworn in as secretary.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly insisted that the SAVE America Act, which would require proof of citizenship to vote and implement nationwide voter ID, must be passed to secure American elections. However, the bill has faced an uncertain future in the Senate because it lacked the necessary 60 votes.
If the Senate uses reconciliation to pass the SAVE America Act, as Mullin signaled, it would only need 50 votes to pass. However, because the act is not budget-related, some say the Senate parliamentarian will likely reject its provisions in the process.
Trump told The Daily Signal, “We’re certainly talking about reconciliation.”
Mullin noted that Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the chairman of the Senate Committee on the Budget, “is committed to making sure we get reconciliation through, if that is in some form, with funding [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] and possibly backfilling from the ‘One, Big Beautiful Bill,’ but also more importantly, the SAVE America Act.”
Democrats have voted against funding the Department of Homeland Security to demand policy changes to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Reports say that Republicans and Democrats are close to a deal on a bill that would fund the entire department except for ICE, which has received separate funding under the “One Big, Beautiful Bill.”
Republicans could then fund ICE and pass the SAVE America Act through reconciliation.
When asked by The Daily Signal if he would support such a deal that separates ICE funding from the overall funding package, Trump said, “They’re working on all of that.”
“That’s a detail that they’ll explain later,” he said.
Mullin emphasized the need for the SAVE America Act, saying 80% of the population wants only American citizens to vote.
“I believe that everybody wants election integrity,” Mullin said. “Fortunately, Lindsey Graham said through reconciliation he’s willing to put the framework out for that.”
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, who sponsored the SAVE America Act, said in a post on X, “It’s hard to imagine how the SAVE America Act could be passed through reconciliation.”
“And by ‘hard’ I mean ‘essentially impossible,’” he said.
“When you really don’t want to do something so you claim you’ll ‘put it in reconciliation’ and then blame the parliamentarian for being the problem,” Conservative Partnership Institute Vice President Rachel Bovard said of the strategy.
“A Washington classic!” she added in a post on X.
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., has urged the “smart lawyers” in Congress to rework the SAVE America Act to comply with the Senate parliamentarian.
“You don’t know till you try, and we haven’t tried,” he said.
A second reconciliation bill is uncertain, said Lora Ries, Heritage Foundation immigration expert.
“Claiming that such an uncertain bill is where the SAVE America Act can pass is a Lucy-with-the-football move,” she told The Daily Signal. “The Parliamentarian would likely strike it for failing the Byrd test (not budget-related). Don’t be Charlie Brown trying to kick Lucy’s football.”