Congress
Ron Johnson is threatening to tank the GOP megabill. He’s been here before.
Ron Johnson is no stranger to being a squeaky wheel inside the Senate GOP. Now he’s asking for trillions of dollars worth of grease.
The frequently cantankerous Wisconsin senator is pushing his fellow Republicans to deliver huge spending cuts as part of their party-line domestic policy bill — and vowing to block President Donald Trump’s top legislative priority if his demands, which are shared by a small cadre of fiscal hawks, aren’t met.
As the megabill moves through the House, Johnson’s increasingly vocal warnings are an early indicator for Senate GOP leaders and the White House that they’ve got major headaches awaiting across the Capitol. Senate Republicans can only afford three defections on the expected party-line vote.
“I think there’s enough of us that would say, ‘No, that’s not adequate,’” Johnson said in an interview where he described his insistence on returning the federal government to “pre-pandemic” level of spending.
The math issue that creates for Republicans is stark: The House GOP is struggling to hit $1.5 trillion in spending cuts, while Johnson and his allies want to go much, much further. Returning to the level of federal expenditures that predates multiple rounds of pandemic stimulus, a major infrastructure bill and the Democrats’ own domestic-policy megabill would, by Johnson’s own estimation, require more than $6 trillion in cuts.
GOP leaders might laugh off such an audacious demand if Johnson didn’t have a history of getting what he wants.
The last time Republicans wrote a party-line tax bill, in 2017, he vowed to oppose the package as he pushed for better treatment of so-called “pass-through” businesses, which comprise most privately held companies. Formerly an executive for a Oshkosh plastics manufacturer, Johnson argued that the bill needed to benefit smaller businesses as much as it would benefit large corporations that were in line to get a major rate cut.
His hardball tactics paid off big time: Republicans ultimately included a new 20 percent deduction rate for pass-through business income, an estimated $414 billion line item in the $1.5 trillion Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
Now, with key TCJA provisions expiring, he’s asking for roughly 10 times the fiscal impact, and his colleagues have learned not to brush him off.
“He’s as serious as a heart attack,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), who credited Johnson for driving a hard bargain back in 2017. But he also suggested any Republican would have a hard time standing in the way of the party’s top legislative priority: “Sometimes when confronted with a binary choice people compromise a little more.”
While Johnson is setting his sights in the multi-trillion-dollar range, he’s hinting that a substantially smaller settlement might be possible: He suggested in an interview that lawmakers could enshrine a chunk of the overall cuts in the pending GOP bill while also setting up a bicameral commission to find the rest by going “line-by-line” through the federal budget.
“Elon Musk is showing us how to do this right?” he said. “You expose, ‘Whoa, what are we doing spending money on that?’” he said.
But Johnson hasn’t yet found buy-in for that idea from colleagues who have been burned by one too many deficit-cutting commissions that ultimately sputtered. The response he’s gotten, he said, is “we don’t have time to do it.”
“Well, okay then, I don’t have the support for the bill,” Johnson said.
GOP leaders believe they have a strategy to navigate around Johnson, which goes back to their decision to bundle together wildly disparate parts of their domestic agenda — tax cuts, border security upgrades, deportation funding, energy incentives, Pentagon plus-ups and more.
That, they believe, will make it too big to fail. But Johnson had a less optimistic metaphor as he gaggled with reporters on Wednesday, saying it instead “might be like the Titanic and may be going down.”
Johnson has instead repeatedly floated breaking up the bill into two or three or more pieces — something that would force GOP leaders in both chambers to abandon a hard-fought budget blueprint and go back to the drawing board.
He’s no stranger to playing the skunk-at-the-garden-party role inside the Senate GOP. Abandoned by national party committees during his 2016 Senate run, he has long felt unusually free to chart his own path and sometimes critique his own party’s leadership. He’s used his leadership posts on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee to pursue matters top GOP leaders would otherwise just leave alone — most recently conspiracy theories related to the 9/11 terror attacks.
Johnson’s not the only potential Senate Republican holdout GOP leaders are dealing with on the “big, beautiful bill.” Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky is all but guaranteed to be a “no” after opposing the budget blueprint. Several others are viewed as potential swing votes, including Republican Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine.
Asked about the House bill, Murkowski quipped, “It’s not beautiful yet.”
Senators are expected to make changes to the House bill, if and when it comes over, meaning Johnson will have an opportunity to put his stamp on the legislation. He’s a member of the Finance Committee, which has broad jurisdiction over both taxes and health care, where the GOP is looking to reap most of the savings.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, another Finance member who put a big stamp on the 2017 bill, said Republicans are looking to end up with spending cuts on the “north end” of the $1.5 trillion to $2 trillion range.
“We take all our members seriously,” Thune said about Johnson. “I know it’s a huge priority for him, which is why I’ve suggested all along that [the House] prioritize spending cuts in the package.”
Republicans, of course, are also betting that Trump can ultimately force the fiscal hawks, who are typically more MAGA-aligned than moderates like Collins and Murkowski, to stand down. That’s what happened earlier this year when the budget plan was teetering, and Johnson was invited with other fiscal hard-liners on the Budget Committee to meet with Trump at the White House.
Johnson was among them, and he, too, eventually fell in line.
Now, he says, he’s determined to make good on campaign promises to get the nation’s fiscal house in order that date back to his first run as a tea-party-influenced political outsider in 2010.
“I’m trying to lead,” he told reporters Wednesday, adding, “When I talk to Trump about it, he agrees with my approach.”
LE SUEUR, Minnesota — The word on John Thune’s mind these days is “resources.”
In the Senate majority leader’s recollection, it was a dominant topic in his recent conversations with President Donald Trump, including at a recent visit to the White House, not to mention in his frequent conversation with Trump’s political team — and in an exclusive conversation with Blue Light News Monday during a Midwest campaign swing.
“I think the president is sincerely interested in trying to do whatever he can to help the team,” Thune said about his midterm conversations with the president and his advisers. “I also share with him, too, the importance of just the resources in some of these states. You know, some of the states have gotten very expensive.”
As Trump focuses on turning out his own voters — a message the president is taking into his own hands in a series of preelection rallies — Thune is making sure he also has money on his mind: “I … just conveyed to him the importance of ensuring that our candidates are well-resourced.”
Thune’s focus underscores the emerging question defining the 2026 midterms: Is there enough Republican money, and can it be spent fast enough, to counter surging Democratic campaigns and a lackluster national environment for the GOP?
It’s a narrative both sides largely agree on — Thune’s Democratic counterpart, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, said as much last week — even as each leader insists his side will prevail.
Thune declined Monday to put odds on the GOP’s chances of keeping control of the Senate but said repeatedly, “I think we can keep the majority.”
“I think all of these races are margin of error, at least the ones that we have to win,” he added. “And historically, at least if you look at polls, we tend to outperform them.”
Unlike Schumer, who is keeping a low profile in October and focusing on private fundraising, Thune is barnstorming the country — visiting a mix of deep-red and battleground states.
Minnesota was not expected to be in play for Republicans when Thune took over as leader nearly two years ago. Democratic incumbent Sen. Tina Smith had a clear path to reelection in a state that has not elected a GOP senator since 2002.
But Smith chose to retire, and Democrats nominated an unabashed progressive, Peggy Flanagan, who is now facing Michele Tafoya, the well-known former sportscaster, in November. Recent public polls have shown the race in single digits, and Thune was not shy about including it alongside Michigan and New Hampshire as a GOP pickup opportunity.
Mentioning Minnesota is one thing, but investing in it is another, and national groups affiliated with Thune have not made major investments in the state so far. Standing next to Thune at a news conference Monday, Tafoya made the case for that to change.
“We have had three or four straight weeks of really solid polls,” she said. “This is one worth investing in. We are right there.”
But they both kept things vague when asked about Washington Republicans’ potential commitment to the race — including how much cash would be necessary to overcome 24 years of futility and a bad political environment.
Both Thune and Tafoya used the same words to answer that question: “We haven’t had that conversation.”
Thune put the party’s spending decisions into a larger context: “If the president is looking for places where he can make a difference … we’re in touch on a daily basis with his team and hopefully they will — as they already have — continue to help us leverage the resources that we’ve got to bring to bear to get the best possible impact and outcome in these key states.”
Thune pointed to Minnesota as one possible state where Trump could choose to deploy his $400-million-plus war chest. But the tiny national footprint in the Gopher State pales next to the hundreds of millions of dollars being spent in Texas — an expensive state Thune and Trump continue to discuss as Republicans struggle to drag Senate nominee Ken Paxton over the finish line.
Asked about the super-sized investments there, Thune declined to connect the massive spending on Paxton to tough decisions elsewhere on the map. “Dedicated donors” focused on Texas, he said, have meant GOP groups haven’t yet had to siphon funding away from other key states.
But the tough decisions are nevertheless underway. As Republican candidates play defense in a growing list of red states, the Thune-aligned Senate Leadership Fund recently pulled back spending in North Carolina — essentially surrendering a GOP-held seat to Democrats — while increasing its spending in Kansas.
Thune referred to the decision as a “pause” in financial support for nominee Michael Whatley.
The reasons for the political headwinds were on display Monday at an agriculture-focused roundtable, where Thune and Tafoya heard about the impact of Trump’s trade war with Canada, the president’s decision to import foreign beef and the high diesel prices that followed his decision to attack Iran.
Thune, a South Dakotan fluent in farm-state politics, touted Tafoya as someone who could help address some of those concerns by being a “great voice on issues like agriculture” if she makes it to the Senate.
His broader message in the interview, however, was to cast the midterm election as “choice” between the two parties rather than a referendum on the Iran war and the ensuing spike in energy prices. Democrats want “more spending,” “higher costs,” and “open borders,” he said, while Republicans had put “more money in your pockets” with their 2025 tax bill.
“Iran is temporary,” he said. “It will be behind us. Gas prices are going to come down, so who do you want to invest in for the next two years, four years?”
The midterm results carry personal stakes for Thune, who is expected to run for leader again in internal Senate GOP elections that are expected to take place just days after the midterms, regardless of the outcome.
Thune remains well-liked within the Senate GOP conference, and no other senator has raised his or her hand to run against him. But some conservatives, in and out of the Senate, have privately questioned whether Trump would publicly turn on Thune if Republicans lose their majority.
Asked about that possibility, Thune said, “I can’t control that.” He added that “the Republican conference” would ultimately make the decision.
“What the president does or doesn’t do … you just move forward and let the chips fall where they may,” he said. “All I can say is, I’m with him and his team to do the things I think are good for the future of the country.”
When Blue Light News pointed out Trump defended Thune at last month’s GOP midterm convention after some in the crowd booed the mention of his name, he laughed.
“Yeah, I know,” he said. “It’s the little things, right?”
The chair of the House Agriculture Committee said he’s not willing to “accept bad results” as a tradeoff for the benefits of advancements in artificial intelligence — a direct rebuttal to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
“As someone who practiced health care for 28 years, I’m never willing to accept bad results. I think we just need to do our best,” Rep. G.T. Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican, told reporters Monday.
He was responding to Altman’s comments to Decoded by Blue Light News that people “should accept some bad things happening for the benefits of this technology and people having the agency.”
Pressed further on whether he agreed with Altman’s premise, Thompson replied, “No, I think we have to work harder to prevent any bad things from happening.”
Altman’s comments come in the wake of increased panic over the risks of catastrophic destruction from AI, with many industry leaders and experts arguing that guardrails are needed on the technology to prevent it from spinning out of human control.
Pressure is building on Congress to regulate the rapidly-advancing technology, but lawmakers are divided over whether the AI industry needs federal regulation or if it’s capable of governing itself.
The executives of major AI labs and tech companies gathered at the White House last week to discuss solutions with President Donald Trump, who believes overregulating AI will have national security repercussions. The group ended up signing a “morally binding” AI accord that critics say won’t do enough to prevent a worst-case scenario.
Thompson noted Monday he believes that AI will bring “tremendous solutions,” specifically in regards to finding cures for health issues like cancer and Alzheimer’s disease. But he also said AI has to be led with “principle” — comparing it to how he addressed digital assets in a bill to regulate the cryptocurrency industry, which he worked on as chair of the Agriculture Committee.
“The first principle is ‘do no harm.’ So we need to protect consumers, and that means, I think, building some guardrails — some guidelines — to do that,” Thompson said. He added that the second principle is to “foster innovation.”
“I think AI has a lot to do with that,” he added. “I don’t think AI works without RI: Real Intelligence.”
LE SUEUR, Minnesota — Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday there is no “consensus” yet on advancing a bill establishing permanent daylight saving time even as President Donald Trump ramps up pressure on Republicans to pass it.
Thune addressed the matter in a Monday interview after Trump used his Truth Social account multiple times over the weekend to rail against the legislation, known as the Sunshine Protection Act — going so far as to post the personal cell phone number of one of its GOP opponents, Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas.
“The president feels strongly on it like he does a lot of issues,” he said. “It’s something we’re having conversations about but there’s no clear path forward or consensus on it yet.”
While Trump singled out Cotton for scrutiny, Thune made clear the opposition to the permanent daylight saving time proposal — which would lead to very late winter sunrises in some parts of the country — ran deeper than one senator.
Cotton has publicly voiced opposition to the proposal for year, citing, among other things, the fact that children in his state would be going to school in the dark for part of the year.
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) voiced similar objections Monday to reporters in the Capitol, saying he was mindful of “safety concerns in the more northern and rural states where children get on the school bus in very early hours.”
Thune, who spoke during a campaign swing in Minnesota with GOP Senate nominee Michele Tafoya, has himself opposed previous daylight saving bills. He said Monday that “a lot of it depends on where you are in the country” and that “your geography probably has as much to do with your position on that as anything.”
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who has aligned himself closely with Trump, is among the lawmakers who have been pushing to get the bill through the Senate. He recently told POLITICO, “I’m going to make sure it gets passed this year.”
Riley Rogerson contributed to this report.
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