Donald Trump has Mike Johnson in another no-win situation

For the entirety of his time leading the House, carrying out Congress’ most routine function has given him the most grief. Johnson now finds himself under pressure from his right flank and former President Donald Trump to go on yet another quixotic snipe hunt This time around, Johnson’s task from the MAGA wing of his party is to get the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act signed into law. If enacted, it would mandate that people registering to vote would have to present documentary proof of U.S. citizenship when filling out their paperwork. As I noted when the House passed the SAVE Act as a stand-alone bill in July, that requirement would only add a hurdle that millions of people would not easily be able to clear while doing nothing to prevent the supposed problem. Because, while Republicans have tried to frame the bill as a necessary safeguard to prevent noncitizens from voting in federal elections, that’s absolutely not the case. Despite what Johnson has claimed, Democrats are not opposing the SAVE Act because “they want [undocumented immigrants] to vote in our elections.” Nor is there a mass voter fraud network, as Trump and his allies have insinuated. We’re talking about this now because Congress has only funded the federal government’s operations for the current fiscal year, which ends on Sept. 30. Since it seems somehow physically impossible for Congress to get this process done before that annual deadline, what we normally see is a stopgap measure known as a continuing resolution, which temporarily resets the clock until full spending bills are approved or the deadline in the CR has passed. Whenever a deadline approaches for funding the government, the “chaos caucus” tries to force Democrats to accept draconic spending cuts, far-right policies, or both. But in an extreme case of gambler’s fallacy, they are certain that things will work out differently this time. Johnson should know how much of an utter disaster it would be to have the GOP be blamed for a government shutdown as the November election looms As the highest-ranking elected Republican, and someone who won’t be speaker next year if Republicans don’t hold onto the House, Johnson should know how much of an utter disaster it would be to have the GOP be blamed for a government shutdown as the November election looms. “I would shut down the government in a heartbeat if they don’t get it,” he said on the “Monica Crowley Show” last week. And if it’s not in the bill, you want to close it up.” That brings us to our current looming disaster. Johnson told his caucus on Wednesday that he’ll bring a spending bill to the floor that would punt the current fiscal deadline back to March and attach the SAVE Act. In doing so, he’s committed himself to a no-win scenario that could hurt the party’s chances of retaining its extremely slender majority. But Democrats are more inclined to only push the deadline back to (in what has become something of an odd Washington tradition) December, instead of March. It would be likely then that the Senate, controlled by Democrats, would simply pass a clean CR with that date altered and send it to the House, putting the onus on Johnson to get the votes to see that it is approved. At worst, Johnson refuses to bring a Senate bill to the floor without the SAVE Act attached as Trump would prefer, bringing the gears of government grinding to a halt while his members are out trying to convince voters to send them back to Washington. As things stand, though, it’s not even clear Johnson has the GOP votes for this current framework. – This Summarize was created by Neural News AI (V1). Source: https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-mike-johnson-save-act-shutdown-rcna169568