Trump renews calls for third reconciliation bill as Iran ceasefire collapses

President Donald Trump’s push for a third reconciliation bill is taking on new urgency after the collapse of the Iran ceasefire, raising fresh questions about whether congressional Republicans will use the party-line budget process to approve hundreds of billions of dollars in new defense spending before leaving Washington for the August recess.

Trump has called on House and Senate Republican leaders to make passing another reconciliation bill that includes defense funding a top priority before lawmakers leave Washington for the August recess.

“When Congress returns, we must pass Reconciliation 3.0, with 350 Billion Dollars for Defense, plus THE SAVE AMERICA ACT!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “I am calling on House and Senate Leadership to make this their Number One Priority, and ensure that 350 Billion Dollars in Recon 3.0 moves out of the Budget Committee as soon as Congress is back in session.”

The request comes as the administration faces the prospect of renewed fighting with Iran. The U.S. launched strikes on Iran this week after Trump declared the ceasefire over, potentially reigniting a conflict the White House had hoped to contain.

That has complicated the politics of the next reconciliation package. Republicans have spent months discussing a third bill focused on affordability, healthcare, energy, and rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse. But the renewed confrontation with Iran has shifted attention to whether Congress will need to approve additional military funding, and whether fiscal conservatives will demand that the money be paid for.

Rep. Mark Harris (R-NC) told the Washington Examiner that he supports including military funding in Reconciliation 3.0, adding that Congress has a responsibility to fund military operations, but any new funding must be done responsibly and not with a “blank check.”

But Iran funding isn’t the only roadblock the bill faces.

It is unclear whether the voter ID language would pass the Senate’s Byrd rule, which governs policies allowed in reconciliation bills, in its current form, leaving many SAVE America Act advocates unhappy.

“The save America act cannot be placed in reconciliation and I’m not drinking the Kool-Aid,” Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL), a staunch advocate for the SAVE America Act, wrote on X last month. “Neither should you.”

Tensions have been flying between the House and Senate since the Senate’s most recent failure to pass the bill, which Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) has said can’t clear the 60-vote filibuster threshold.

The House floor has been at a standstill for weeks over the GOP’s inability to pass procedural rule votes to allow legislation to come to the floor because a coalition of Republicans is refusing to vote to advance legislation over a grab bag of issues, including the Senate’s inability to pass the SAVE America Act.

The gridlock has some reconciliation champions worried they’re running out of time.

“After this recess, if it doesn’t happen in the first couple of days, then I think it’s in real trouble,” Republican Study Committee Chairman August Pfluger (R-TX), the architect of a reconciliation framework, told Politico before the July 4 recess.

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All of this comes just a month after congressional Republicans were in a sprint to craft a funding deal providing up to $70 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and its sister agency, Border Patrol, through the reconciliation process. Trump initially said he wanted the measure on his desk by June 1, but did not sign it into law until June 10.

The Washington Examiner reached out to Johnson’s office and the RSC for comment.