President Donald Trump has begun tying his desire to repeal the Senate‘s filibuster rule to next year‘s midterm elections and the 2028 presidential contest, contending that Republicans will perform better if they can ram their legislative agenda through the upper chamber.
The Senate filibuster rule, which tends to frustrate the party in the majority and is preferred by the minority party, requires 60 senators to support ending debate in the chamber so that a vote on the measure in question can be held.
However, Trump on Tuesday took to social media to complain that “it will be impossible for Republicans to get Common Sense Policies done with these Crazed Democrat Lunatics being able to block everything by withholding their votes.”
“FOR THREE YEARS, NOTHING WILL BE PASSED, AND REPUBLICANS WILL BE BLAMED,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Elections, including the Midterms, will be rightfully brutal. If we do terminate the Filibuster, we will get EVERYTHING approved, like no Congress in History.”
Trump argued the priorities Republicans could pass without the filibuster include measures regarding “FAIR, FREE, and SAFE Elections, No Men in Women’s Sports or Transgender for Everybody, Strong Borders,” and “Major Tax and Energy Cuts,” in addition to proposals that could protect the Second Amendment.
“If we don’t do it, they are far more likely to do well in the upcoming Elections, which would mean a PACKED Supreme Court, 2 more States and 4 more Democrat Senators (D.C. and Puerto Rico), and 8 more Electoral Votes,” Trump wrote. “Remember, Republicans, they are going to end the Filibuster as soon as they get the chance We know this because they already tried, and the only two people who didn’t go along are now out of office.”
Democrats made a concerted effort to repeal the filibuster in 2022 over concerns regarding voting measures introduced by states, such as Georgia. However, the party was prevented from passing the repeal by former independent Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona.
“TERMINATE THE FILIBUSTER NOW, END THE RIDICULOUS SHUTDOWN IMMEDIATELY, AND THEN, MOST IMPORTANTLY, PASS EVERY WONDERFUL REPUBLICAN POLICY THAT WE HAVE DREAMT OF, FOR YEARS, BUT NEVER GOTTEN,” Trump wrote on Tuesday. “WE WILL BE THE PARTY THAT CANNOT BE BEATEN – THE SMART PARTY!!!”
He followed the lengthy post up with another one about an hour later that simply said, “TERMINATE THE FILIBUSTER!!!”
Trump has become increasingly frustrated with the Senate amid the historically long federal government shutdown, as Republicans have not had the votes to fund the government until Nov. 21 through a continuing resolution, or a measure that will extend current spending levels for a couple of weeks.
However, Trump does not have the endorsement of Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), who has repeatedly expressed his opposition to repealing the filibuster.
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Trump’s desire to repeal the filibuster coincides with more general concerns about his political legacy, given the unproductiveness of Congress so far during his second administration, aside from its passage of the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
As of Tuesday morning, Democrats have a slight, early average 4-percentage-point edge over Republicans in generic congressional ballot polling. They also have the advantage of a majority of respondents who consider the country to be headed in the wrong direction in right track-wrong track polling, at least according to polling aggregator RealClearPolitics, a year before the 2026 elections.
