Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said the upper legislative chamber’s filibuster rule will remain in place, striking a major blow to the effort to pass the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, which would require proof of citizenship to register to vote and valid identification to cast a ballot.
Thune said “there aren’t anywhere close to the votes” to change the filibuster rule, according to The Hill.
The Senate filibuster is a procedural rule requiring a 60-vote supermajority to end debate and advance legislation.
Democrats, with the exception of Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), have vowed to block the SAVE Act.
The Hill explained further:
Thune pledged to protect the Senate’s filibuster rule, which requires 60 votes to advance legislation, when he ran for Senate majority leader in 2024.
He said his position is broadly supported within the Senate Republican Conference.
“It’s not just me not being willing to do it. There aren’t anywhere close to the votes, not even close, to nuking the filibuster,” he said of a proposal to lower the threshold for advancing legislation to a simple majority by voting along partisan lines to establish new precedent.
Effectively changing the Senate’s rules with a party-line vote overruling the presiding chair or Senate parliamentarian is viewed as so extreme that it’s nicknamed “the nuclear option.”
Thune said the proposal “doesn’t have a future. Is there another way of getting there? We’ll see,” he said.
“Remember, the talking filibuster is best understood as the filibuster. Historically, senators have been required to speak in order to filibuster. You shouldn’t be able to have the benefits of the filibuster without doing the work of the filibuster, and that means speaking,” Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) commented.
Footage below:
If senators aren’t speaking
They’re not filibustering pic.twitter.com/Fspi5wRr8T
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) February 10, 2026
“It’s time for Republicans to do what they have to do and that’s terminate the filibuster,” President Trump previously said.
“If you don’t terminate the filibuster, you’ll be in bad shape. We won’t pass any legislation,” he continued.
Check it out:
🚨BREAKING: President Trump just told every Republican senator to their FACES they MUST end the filibuster, or nothing will be passed for 3+ years
“START TONIGHT! Pass voter ID, no mail-in voting, all the things, make our elections secure and safe!” 🔥🔥
“John, they’ve done a… pic.twitter.com/yctEWYPaAR
— Right Scope 🇺🇸 (@RightScopee) February 3, 2026
CNBC has more:
The “talking” filibuster — made famous by the movie “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” — has not been regularly practiced since a Senate rule change in the 1970s, and even some supporters of the legislation have reservations about a reversion back to the old ways.
“I think getting rid of the filibuster would lead to more acrimony, more rapid shifts from right to left, and I think wouldn’t be good for the country,” Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who said he supports the voter-ID bill, told reporters on Tuesday. “I think the default position is liberty and that most legislation takes your liberty. And so I’m not a big fan of making it easier to pass legislation.”
Filibuster reform aside, the voter-ID proposal is controversial and faces an uncertain fate in both chambers as Trump last week called for the federal government to take control of elections from states.
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a GOP centrist, announced on X on Tuesday that she does not support the legislation.