Former Senate parliamentarian Alan Frumin has defended current Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough after President Donald Trump called on Senate Majority Leader John Thune to remove her. The clash follows MacDonough’s rulings related to an immigration-enforcement budget bill and a separate push by Trump for a voter identification requirement.
President Donald Trump has called on Senate Majority Leader John Thune to remove Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough after she ruled that money tied to security and other costs connected to Trump’s planned White House ballroom could not be included under the Senate’s special budget rules in a Republican immigration-enforcement funding package.
In an NPR interview aired June 13, former Senate parliamentarian Alan Frumin said MacDonough is “a competent career nonpartisan professional” tasked with interpreting the Senate’s complex rules. Frumin said MacDonough joined the parliamentarian’s office in 1999 and rose through the ranks in the nonpartisan role.
Frumin also said the majority leader can direct the secretary of the Senate to dismiss the parliamentarian, but that he had never previously seen a president apply public pressure to do so. Asked whether Trump had a fair legislative case for his complaints, Frumin said he had not heard a “rational argument” against MacDonough’s actions and that she was doing her job.
MacDonough’s recent decisions have come amid a broader fight over how Republicans can advance major initiatives in the closely divided Senate. NPR has reported that Trump has also pressed Republicans to eliminate the filibuster to move his voter ID proposal.
Separately, an Associated Press report on a May ruling said MacDonough advised that a $1 billion White House security proposal tied in part to the ballroom project did not comply with the procedural requirements for inclusion in a budget bill designed to pass with a simple majority, prompting Republicans to revise their legislative approach.
