President Donald Trump on Wednesday demanded Senate Republicans fire the nonpartisan Senate parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, after she ruled this weekend that Republicans could not include funding for the White House ballroom in an immigration enforcement bill.
Trump accused MacDonough of thwarting his agenda and urged Republicans to “get smart and tough,” escalating his long-running attacks on procedural hurdles inside Congress.
“Shockingly, Republicans have kept the very important position of ‘Parliamentarian’ in the hands of a woman, Elizabeth MacDonough, who was appointed, long ago, by Barack Hussein Obama and a vicious Lunatic known as Senator Harry Reid, who ran the Senate for the Dumocrats with an ‘iron fist,’” Trump posted on Truth Social. “Over the years, she has been brutal to Republicans, but not so to the Dumocrats — So why has she not been replaced?”
Obama did not have a say in MacDonough’s appointment in 2012.
The broadside came just days after MacDonough ruled that a provision allowing roughly $1 billion in White House and Secret Service security funding tied to Trump’s ballroom project could not be included in Republicans’ reconciliation package under Senate rules.
The decision was a significant setback for Republicans, who had hoped to pass the funding with a simple majority vote as part of a broader immigration and border security package. MacDonough determined that the provision requires 60 votes in the Senate, all but dooming the idea.
On Monday, Semafor reported that Trump called Senate Majority Leader John Thune, urging him to fire MacDonough.
Trump and his allies have argued the ballroom itself would be funded through private donations, while administration officials sought federal funding for related security upgrades, including hardened infrastructure, drone detection systems and Secret Service facilities.
On Tuesday, Trump defended the project amid mounting criticism from Democrats and skepticism from some Republicans over using taxpayer dollars for a project the president initially framed as privately financed.
During a tour of the construction site, Trump insisted the effort was “a gift to the United States of America” and said donors — not taxpayers — were paying for the ballroom itself.
