U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) appeared on The Ben Shapiro Show, Martha MacCallum’s Fox News program, and The Hugh Hewitt Show on March 18 to discuss legislative priorities including the SAVE America Act, the legislative filibuster, and recent Department of Homeland Security funding debates.
Thune addressed the importance of election integrity and legislative procedures as Congress considers key policy issues. He said the SAVE America Act is designed to ensure that only eligible citizens vote in U.S. elections by requiring photo identification. “The SAVE America Act is a package of just commonsense policies that should get an automatic ‘yes,’ literally from every member of the Senate. And the core of it … is a requirement for Americans to demonstrate that they’re eligible to vote and that they are who they say they are when they go to do so. And requiring a photo ID for a whole lot of things in this country is something that … Americans expect. You would think that [the Democrats would] be able to produce one to vote in our elections … We just have to do everything we can to make sure that we’re pounding [Democrats] over the course of the next week or two, and then we’ll see where the votes are.”
He also commented on Democratic opposition regarding noncitizen voting: “[Democrats’ position is] a very indefensible position, in my view, to say that noncitizens ought to be able to vote in American elections, but that seems to be the position that they’ve adopted at the moment. But we’ve got an opportunity, over the course of the next few days and perhaps into next week, to litigate the issue, to have … the debate on the floor, and to put Democrats on defense and on the record on whether or not they think it ought to be just American citizens who vote in American elections. This is a very straightforward issue, and we intend to make sure that the choice is clear.”
On preserving Senate rules, Thune said: “Historically … the filibuster has protected conservative principles and priorities way more than it has Democrats’. And Democrats, typically, if you look throughout history, have had majorities in the House and the Senate more frequently than Republicans … The idea of enabling all the things that [Democrats] would do if they were able to nuke the legislative filibuster and pass their agenda with 51 votes, you’d start with … adding Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., as states. You’d go to expanding the Supreme Court. You’d federalize our elections. You’d have a wealth tax. You’d have … abortion on demand …” He added: “Republicans in the Senate, by a big majority, support the legislative filibuster for that reason… It’s a feature of the Senate that goes back to the country’s founding.”
Discussing recent appropriations disputes affecting homeland security operations such as cybersecurity efforts within DHS, Thune said: “It’s a dangerous world. We’ve got cyber threats… They are held so hostage by the far left in the country right now and are so infected with Trump Derangement Syndrome… This is about politics, nothing more, nothing less, for them.”
Thune has served as Senate majority leader as well as Republican whip and conference chairman according to his official website. He serves on committees including Agriculture; Commerce; Science; Transportation; Nutrition; Forestry; and Finance according to his official website. Thune grew up in Murdo, South Dakota where meeting a congressman inspired his interest in public service according to his official website. He earned degrees from Biola University (bachelor’s) and University of South Dakota (MBA) according to his official website.
Thune won historic Senate races—including defeating an incumbent party leader—and ran unopposed in another election according to his official website. He lives with his wife Kimberley in Sioux Falls; together they raised two daughters and have six grandchildren according to his official website.
