Trump intensifies his grip on congressional GOP agenda

Donald Trump is tightening his stranglehold on the congressional GOP’s policy agenda as he reshapes Republican lawmakers' party orthodoxy on national security and social issues.

Trump’s sway was on full display Wednesday as the House tried to take up a warrantless government surveillance bill that was intended to unite the party. Then, hours after the former president pushed to “kill” the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act reauthorization, 19 House Republicans did just that.

He’s also successfully nudging most anti-abortion conservatives to accept his call to abandon a national standard — what was once a consensus position in the GOP. That’s on top of Trump’s long-standing opposition to new Ukraine aid, which remains stalled on the Hill.

So far, Trump is showing more proclivity for blocking GOP policy proposals than shaping them affirmatively, such as the bipartisan border deal that he stopped earlier this year. But even the former president's views of support for higher tariffs, a further rebuke of past GOP stances on free trade, aren't drawing the same friendly fire as they did during his first term.

The signs all point to a far more Trump-ified Washington until the November election, and a super-charged one should he win the White House again. Many senior Republicans who served as establishment bulwarks against his influence are retiring or ceding power, in the case of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s plan to exit leadership this year. And MAGA recruits are filtering into Congress every two years.

"Voters are saying that they don't want the Republican Party of the 90s,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who joined Congress in 2019 in the GOP's first wave of Trump-aligned lawmakers. “What's the big achievement there? Trade that destroyed American jobs? Letting China into the WTO and weakening our position in the world? And endless wars? People don’t want that."

Trump's first four years in office featured no shortage of tense battles with the congressional GOP on trade, foreign policy and confirmation of his polarizing nominees. This time, Trump's growing base of reflexive support and reluctance to challenge him among Hill Republicans is paving the way for what could prove a more friendly GOP Congress in his potential second term.

As Senate Republicans weigh a new leader and Speaker Mike Johnson runs the House as a Trump ally — even when the former president undercuts him — Trump's moves amp up pressure on some GOP lawmakers who see their party's ideology continuing to shift. It's a high-stakes moment of transition for party leaders.

“Part of the problem is what I would call traditional Republicans have just assumed the status quo is going to continue. And obviously that's being challenged on a number of fronts,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who is running to take over from McConnell. “What it means is we're going to have to work harder to make the case for the policies that we believe in.”

After Trump left office in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, his influence waned for a time as McConnell and other Senate Republicans cut major bipartisan deals with Democrats. After Trump easily dispatched his challengers for the GOP nomination, however, the failure of the border deal and House surveillance bill make clear that he's more powerful in the Capitol.

The House GOP raced ahead of the Senate in terms of ideological evolution, but it’s not difficult to see the Trumpy direction of even the upper chamber as pugnacious Republicans like J.D. Vance of Ohio and Eric Schmitt of Missouri replace more establishment veterans.

“Most of our members will want to do what he tells them to do. I mean, that's just the reality,” said retiring Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, the only GOP lawmaker who backed both Trump impeachments. “I wish there were more that took my point of view on issues, but I represent a very small slice of the Republican Party these days.”

Certain Republican senators still take positions that break with Trump. Cornyn is in line with him on leaving abortion policy to the states but said Trump's hopes of kneecapping government spy power would omit key information from presidential briefings: “I wouldn't think any president would want to deny themselves that access to that intelligence.”

It's also evident from Trump's presidency that he's open to ending up in a different place than where he starts on policy. He signed an extension of existing government surveillance law and backed away from some less interventionist policy positions when pressured by GOP lawmakers. Of course, he did that while getting nudged toward more conventional approaches by McConnell and former Speaker Paul Ryan.

Things will be different next Congress, when the Senate GOP leader — whether it's Cornyn, Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) or a surprise candidate — will be new to the job. And the next election cycle could send still more Trump acolytes to the Senate, like Bernie Moreno of Ohio, Kari Lake of Arizona and Jim Banks of Indiana. Romney estimated that half the Senate GOP is aligned with Trump, adding that for every member who leaves, like him, the ratio further tips toward the presumptive nominee.

Already GOP leaders are trying to draw some lines. For example, both Thune and Cornyn say they would protect the legislative filibuster even if Trump tries to persuade them to kill it.

“That would be a mistake. I would not agree to eliminate the filibuster,” Cornyn said.

Abortion will be trickier to create distance from Trump on. After GOP lawmakers embraced a federal ban on late-term abortions at a minimum, the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade and splintered the party between supporters of national limits and those who want Congress to stay away from the issue.

Then Trump came out this week against a federal ban. And besides Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, few Republicans argued with him.

“He's going to be the nominee of the party and responsible, probably, for writing the party platform on this subject. And that's where he comes down,” said Thune, who supported a 15-week abortion ban even after Roe fell. “Clearly a lot of our Republican colleagues in the Senate — today — are of a view that this is an issue that ought to be handled by the states.”

National security could prove the most troublesome area of Trump's influence for GOP leaders to manage. That's because, even before Trump launched his first campaign, the tea party had sent libertarian-leaning lawmakers to Capitol Hill, from Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) to Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.).

So when Trump urges his party to “KILL FISA,” well, it wasn’t that much of a leap for some conservatives to push back on reauthorizing government surveillance law without huge changes. Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) said she’s “delighted” by the influx of more libertarian Republicans, though she quibbled with the idea that Trump is calling all the shots.

“Trump tapped into a pre-existing populist mindset. And really channeled it,” Lummis said.

That leaves more hawkish Republicans on the back foot in a GOP that seems to be shifting away from them. Asked about her party’s drift away from long-held national security policies, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) said she was “really worried about it” and said Republicans need to explain why surveillance powers are necessary.

More mainstream Republicans, like Maryland Senate hopeful Larry Hogan or Michigan Senate hopeful Mike Rogers — a former House Intelligence Committee chair — could win this fall and offer more McConnell-style votes to balance out MAGA candidates. But that largely didn't happen in 2022, which ended with Trump counting more congressional GOP allies than ever before.

“It was a good election … for non-establishment, Trump America first. We’ll find out if we get more,” said Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.).