WASHINGTON—Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, and a team of White House aides arrived at a hastily organized meeting near the Senate chamber hoping to reassure Republicans about a $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund” promoted by President Trump.
Sen. Tom Cotton, a Trump ally from Arkansas, wasn’t having it.
“Who thought this was a good idea? Who chose this timing?” Cotton asked bluntly inside the Senate’s ornate Mike Mansfield Room, pressing Blanche, White House legislative affairs director James Braid and others about the fund with a series of point-blank questions, according to people familiar with the tense exchange.
Cotton was far from alone—more than a dozen Republican senators grilled Blanche about the settlement in the two-hour meeting, the people said, questioning its merit and warning that it could derail approval of a $70 billion multiyear package funding immigration enforcement.
“One of the roughest meetings I’ve seen in my entire time in the Senate,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas), said Friday on his podcast. “Fiery does not begin to cut it,” Cruz said, adding that some senators were screaming at Blanche.
For more than a year, Republican senators had largely been deferential to Trump’s wishes—from backing contentious cabinet nominees to giving the president free rein on tariffs and the Iran war.
This week, they revolted en masse, fed up with Trump’s insistence on settling personal scores and pursuing pet projects at the expense of their legislative agenda. The tipping point came when Trump endorsed a rival to Texas Sen. John Cornyn on Tuesday, a move that stunned many of Cornyn’s colleagues. They saw it as a reckless way to treat a senior Republican incumbent whose seat the party can’t afford to lose in November.
“I’m just sad,” said an emotional Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R., Wyo.) after Trump announced the endorsement. She fretted that it would now cost Republicans “a fortune” to try to hold Cornyn’s seat.
Trump’s approval numbers are sinking headed into the midterms. A new Wall Street Journal poll found Trump’s job approval at 41%, with 57% disapproving, down from 45% approval in January. In a troubling sign for the White House, the survey showed that the share of Republicans who say they “strongly approve” of Trump’s job performance had dropped from 75% in January to 57% in May.
The poll also found Democrats leading Republicans, 48% to 40%, in a congressional ballot measuring which party is favored to lead the next Congress. The poll was conducted from May 7 to May 18.
White House spokesperson Olivia Wales said that Trump is “the unequivocal leader, best messenger, and unmatched motivator for the Republican party and he is committed to maintaining Republicans’ majority in Congress to continue delivering wins for the American people.”
ICE funding paralyzed
People familiar with senators’ thinking said far more than half of the GOP conference has concerns about the Justice Department settlement fund, set up to pay people who claim political persecution—including Jan. 6 rioters who stormed the Capitol and could now walk away with millions from the federal government. Many also are uncomfortable with Trump’s push for $1 billion in security funding tied to his planned White House ballroom, a project Trump had insisted would be paid for with private donations.
The “anti-weaponization” fund was created as the result of the administration settling a Trump lawsuit against his own government. It came just ahead of a deadline set by a federal judge, who demanded explanations on how Trump could be on both sides of the case.
The White House “put themselves in a bad spot. It wasn’t Congress that did it. Congress has had no input. Might be part of the problem,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy (R., La.), who lost his recent primary after Trump endorsed a rival.
The fight has paralyzed progress on Republicans’ long-sought bill to provide funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol. Alaska GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski likened it to “dropping a bomb” on the legislative process. Senators wanted to wrap that up this week ahead of Trump’s June 1 deadline but were forced to punt until next month.
Trump told reporters Thursday that he didn’t know if he was losing control of the Senate. He made clear Friday he wasn’t backing down on the fund.
“I could have settled my case…for an absolute fortune,” he said on Truth Social. “Instead, I am helping others, who were so badly abused.”
Trump lashed out at Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.), who had drawn Trump’s ire by labeling the fund a “payout pot for punks” and “stupid on stilts.” The president said Tillis—who decided to retire under pressure from Trump—“can have all the fun he wants for a few months, with some of his RINO friends, screwing the Republican Party.”
Tillis responded that Republicans need to do well in November, but “the stupid stuff is killing our chances!”
GOP senators say the ball is in the administration’s court to make changes to the settlement. According to people familiar with the matter, senators in the meeting with Blanche delivered a message to the White House: You need to fix this.
“The administration is going to have to come up with some suggestions and ideas,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) told reporters Thursday. Asked if Trump’s endorsements against incumbents played into the logjam, he responded: “There’s a political component to everything we do around here.”
Cruz, in his podcast, said he expected the administration would move—at minimum—to modify the fund or face “a full-on revolt” in the Senate.
A White House official said that the administration appreciated Thursday’s feedback and looked forward to more conversations as they are necessary.
Senators primed for a revolt
The chamber was primed for a revolt after Trump’s decision to endorse scandal-tarred Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton over Cornyn in the state’s Republican Senate primary runoff. The decision, in GOP senators’ view, not only puts the traditionally red Texas in play but has also felt personal. Cornyn is a longtime, well-respected fixture of the Senate. He served in leadership, ran for majority leader and has been a prolific fundraiser, collecting more than $400 million in donations for his Senate colleagues, candidates, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee since 2002, according to his campaign’s calculations.
Republicans hold a 53-47 seat majority in the Senate. Republicans have warned that Paxton, who was impeached by his own party and later acquitted and is in the middle of a divorce initiated by his wife on “biblical grounds,” could force the party to spend tens of millions of dollars that could be invested elsewhere on the Senate map, in competitive states such as Maine, North Carolina, Ohio, Iowa and Alaska.
The Paxton endorsement came on the heels of Trump’s ouster of Cassidy, a physician and committee chairman who failed to reach the Senate GOP runoff in his home state after the president endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow (R., La.). Cassidy was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump in the 2021 Senate impeachment trial.
Some Republican aides viewed Trump’s decision to endorse Paxton at the last minute as a sign of his broader frustration with the Senate. Trump has been raging on social media for months about passing the Save America Act, which would require proof of citizenship to vote but lacks the 60 votes required to overcome a Senate filibuster. Trump has called passing the bill critical to Republicans winning the midterms.
Until this week, Senate Republicans, with the exception of a few like Tillis who are retiring or representing swing states, had mostly been deferential to the president.
Almost all backed Trump’s controversial cabinet nominees, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. They nearly all voted for the party’s tax and spending bill last year despite worries about healthcare-spending cuts, and most have gone along with his tariffs. Most have repeatedly voted to block resolutions that would rein in Trump’s Iran war, even as gas prices have risen and Trump’s exit strategy remains murky.
But that support broke down when the Trump administration unveiled the settlement fund, derided by members of both parties as a “slush fund,” just as the House and Senate were hoping to approve their immigration-enforcement funding package.
“Somebody described it as a galactic blunder, and I think that’s probably true,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R., Wis.) said to CNN.
The White House on Friday provided statements from seven Senate Republicans praising Trump and expressing support for his agenda.
“Make no mistake: Senate Republicans and President Trump are united,” said Sen. Bernie Moreno (R., Ohio) in one of the statements.
Former Sen. Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.) who returned to the U.S. Capitol this week for the first time in five years, said Trump’s decision not to endorse Cornyn had affected Senate Republicans because so many members respect the Texas lawmaker.
“I’m not sure what the president’s strategy is in purging Senate Republicans who support him 99% of the time,” said Alexander.
Write to Marianne LeVine at marianne.levine@wsj.com, Ken Thomas at ken.thomas@wsj.com, Lindsay Wise at lindsay.wise@wsj.com and Philip Wegmann at philip.wegmann@wsj.com
