Thune surprised by Trump backing House bill: 'Did not see that one coming'
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters on Wednesday that he was surprised by President Trump's support for the GOP-controlled House's one-bill spending plan as Congress navigates crucial budget negotiations.
"Did not see that one coming," Thune said of Trump's post on Truth Social hours earlier.
In his post, the president praised both the House and Senate for "doing a SPECTACULAR job of working together as one unified, and unbeatable, TEAM," but urged Senate Republicans to look to the House, rather than trying a piecemeal approach to enacting his sweeping agenda.
"House Resolution implements my FULL America First Agenda, EVERYTHING, not just parts of it!" he wrote. “We need both Chambers to pass the House Budget to ‘kickstart’ the Reconciliation process, and move all of our priorities to the concept of, ‘ONE BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL.'"
On Wednesday, Vice President Vance is meeting with Senate Republicans to continue discussions, while Trump is in Florida.
Thune said Vance, who represented Ohio in the Senate for two years, would have an opportunity to "further clarify, elaborate on the White House's views on the subject."
"I think we're all heading in the same direction. We all want to get to the same result and ultimate destination. How we get there is still a point of discussion," the Senate GOP leader said. "It’d be really boring if we had a unicameral system, wouldn’t it?"
Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso (Wyo.), the No. 2 Republican in the chamber, told reporters after Trump's post that senators are “still on schedule” with their budget resolution.
The Republican leaders in the House and Senate have been at odds over the strategy to pass a budget outline, with the Senate plotting out a two-bill approach while the House has stuck to a single-bill strategy.
The Senate on Tuesday teed up a vote for its budget resolution later this week, which would set the guidelines the GOP-controlled Senate uses as it crafts the first of a two-part plan to advance Trump’s legislative agenda.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who is a close ally of Trump, hit back at the Senate's approach this week as the upper chamber's leadership moved the two-step effort.
“We remain laser-focused on sending our bill to President Trump’s desk to secure the border, keep taxes low, restore American energy dominance, strengthen America’s military, and make government work better for all Americans,” Johnson wrote on the social platform X on Tuesday, shortly after Thune outlined plans for the week.
But Thune has defended the upper chamber's approach, while maintaining interest in the House's progress and optimism about the outcome.
"We're planning to proceed. ... We're interested in what the House can pass," he said. "We've got a lot to do and the tax components of it, the deficit-reduction components of it are things that we're going to have to, at some point, agree on. But in the near term, the president has asked for resources to secure the border, we know we have to rebuild our military, and those are priorities that are addressed in the targeted bill that we put together.
"These are small differences with respect to tactics, but in the end the strategic goals are still the same," he added.
The Hill's Al Weaver contributed to this report.
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