What does the Republican ‘trifecta’ mean for Trump and his plan? | 2024 US Election News

Washington, DC – This week, it became official. Not only did the Republican Party win the United States Senate, but it also retained leadership over the House of Representatives, after some of the last prominent races were called.

That puts the party and its champion, President-elect Donald Trump, in a strong position.

Come January, Republicans will have the “trifecta”, controlling the presidency and both houses of Congress.

And experts say the trifecta could pave the way for big changes, with long-term consequences.

“The level of opportunity that Donald Trump has right now is very high,” said Todd Belt, a professor at George Washington University’s Graduate School of Political Management.

In many ways, this year’s trifecta parallels the political landscape in 2016, when Trump won his first bid for the presidency: In that election, Republicans secured majorities in the House and Senate.

But unlike in the aftermath of the 2016 election — when the party’s disagreements derailed some of Trump’s agenda — Republicans have stuck with Trump this time around.

Trump has also had years to gather support for his second term, as he has started his re-election campaign since 2022.

“Trump is going to be very powerful,” Belt said. He pointed not only to the structure of Congress but also to the strong majority of the Supreme Court and its recent decision granting broad immunity to the president.

The ‘relatively weak’ trifecta

Holding tight to government has long been a priority for Trump. Since his first term in office, from 2017 to 2021, Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire to strengthen the executive branch.

“I have the right to do whatever I want as president,” Trump said at the 2019 youth conference.

Trump was also upset by the constraints of having to advance his agenda in the legislative branch and dealing with the administration of the government. Even in his ads this year, he pledged to “get rid of the sick political class”.

The US Constitution, however, places limits on what the different branches of government can do.

As president, Trump will have the power to impose taxes, change how immigration is enforced and make sweeping changes to federal agencies and workers, without congressional approval.

Some parts of Trump’s agenda – especially related to funding the government or changing existing laws – can only be achieved through Congress.

While the Republican trifecta may be seen as a good opportunity for Trump, the party’s narrow control of Congress may reduce that shine, according to Elaine Kamarck, founding director of the Center for Effective Public Management at the Brookings Institution.

After all, the Republican majority in the Senate has only 53 seats out of 100.

On Wednesday, the party crossed the threshold of 218 seats to control the House – but its majority may be narrow even there.

“The only time the trifecta shines is when the margins are tight,” Kamarck told Al Jazeera. “This is a trifecta, but it’s a weak one, and Trump will have to be careful with his decisions and priorities. [policy priorities] to make sure they can get a lot of them.”

The risk, Kamarck explained, is that extreme policy proposals could alienate some Republicans, who may not fully support Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) platform.

Even a few missing votes can prevent a bill from reaching the majority needed to pass.

“On basic policy, things like tax cuts, like cracking down on the border, I’m sure he’ll be able to accomplish a lot,” Kamarck said of Trump.

“But there are going to be other places where he might be obsessed with his MAGA stuff, and that would be very difficult.”

Team cohesion?

Already, Republicans have been promoting unity among members of their party. At a press conference on Wednesday, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson encouraged his colleagues to “stand with this leadership team to move forward”.

“The theme that you will hear over and over again from all of our members, throughout the conference, is that we are united and strong and ready to go,” Johnson said. “We have to deliver to the American people, starting on day one.”

In a letter to party members shortly after the election, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise echoed that sentiment.

He wrote that he had been meeting with Trump’s team for months to “get ready to start this job immediately and start over on the first day of January”, according to the letter, obtained by PunchBowl News.

“Next Congress, we will work closely with President Trump and Senate Republicans every step of the way to ensure success,” Scalise wrote.

Laura Blessing, a senior at the Center for Public Affairs at Georgetown University, explained that Trump actually faces less opposition from his own party than he did during his first term.

He pointed out that seven Republican senators crossed party lines to impeach Trump during his second impeachment trial, when he was accused of impeachment from the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Only three of them remain in the Senate today.

Meanwhile, in the House, only two out of 10 Republicans voted to censure Trump for treason.

But despite Trump’s hero’s welcome since his reelection, Blessing cautioned against using “Republican” and “solidarity” in the same sentence.

Groups like the Trump-aligned Freedom Caucus have a long history of crawling to advance their policy ambitions. Bolstered by Trump’s second term, Republican firebrands may once again explode the heads of moderate members of the party.

“I still think they will make it difficult to manage because these are people who have made a name for themselves as religious leaders,” he told Al Jazeera.

“How that manifests itself in this Congress, we will have to wait and see.”

Overcoming separation

Fault lines within the Republican Party will ultimately determine how much of Trump’s agenda will be codified into law.

But there will be other obstacles preventing the Republican trifecta from achieving all of its policy goals.

In both houses of Congress, bills can be passed with a simple majority. But in the Senate, minority groups — and even individual senators — can stall a bill indefinitely through endless debate, in a process known as a filibuster.

Only with a majority of 60 votes can senators choose to end debate and pass a bill. Without Democratic cooperation, Republicans may fall short of that number.

For budget bills, however, Republicans have another tool they can use to bypass the filibuster.

Both parties have come to rely heavily on a process called “budget reconciliation” to get it passed quickly. That process allows budgets — and any legislation included in them — to pass with a simple majority, bypassing the filibuster.

A member of the Senate, a non-partisan office, ultimately decides which items can be worked through the “reconciliation” process.

‘Not just bending the knee’

In Scalise’s letter, he outlined several key policy priorities for the upcoming Republican-led Congress.

They include locking in Trump’s proposed tax cuts, rolling back federal regulations on energy and supplies to the US-Mexico border, and curbing irregular migration.

While those agenda items have full Republican support, some of his proposed items may be controversial.

Scalise called on Republicans to remove “rebellious ideas” and strengthen the agency’s “election integrity” protections, a reference to Trump’s false claims of widespread election fraud.

Critics also question whether Republicans would roll back the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which includes major measures to combat climate change, or the 2010 Affordable Care Act, which made insurance more accessible to American residents.

The Republican trifecta will make these policy goals more attainable. But the Brookings Institute’s Kamarck warns that the success of the Trump administration may come down to the president’s actions — and how Congress responds to them.

“He is very strong. There is no doubt about it,” said Kamarck. “But the only thing that can limit that power is his choice.”

He pointed out the controversial comments made by Trump to cabinet-level positions.

He named Fox News host Pete Hegseth as his pick for defense secretary, former Democrat Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence, and right-wing congressman Matt Gaetz for attorney general.

That proposal would need to be confirmed in the Senate by a simple majority. But Trump’s choice has already outraged some Republicans, including moderate Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who derided Gaetz as “absurd.”

Belt, a professor at George Washington University, also saw the cabinet appointments as damaging to relations between Trump and other Republicans in Congress.

“It could really derail some of Trump’s momentum,” he said.

“And when you see the president lose power early in the term, that emboldens other members of Congress to work against him and not just bend to his will.”