Thune rejects Trump's call to nationalize elections, warns Dems tried the same

Politics

Thune rejects Trump's call to nationalize elections, warns Dems tried the same

Thune argued it's 'harder to hack 50 election systems than it is to hack one' while supporting voter ID requirements

Alex Miller Fox News

Published

February 3, 2026 12:07pm EST

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FBI Director Kash Patel speaks out on agents seizing Fulton County election records

Fox News correspondent David Spunt has the latest on the FBI's explanation for the seizure of election records in Fulton County, Ga., with a preview of Kayleigh McEnany's interview with Patel on 'Jesse Watters Primetime.'

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The Senate’s top Republican leader threw cold water on President Donald Trump's desire to nationalize elections, arguing he was in favor of "decentralized, distributed power."

Trump, during an appearance on former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino’s podcast, contended that it was "amazing Republicans aren’t tougher" on elections.

"The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over, we should take over the voting in at least many — 15 places,’" Trump said. "The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting. We have states that are so crooked."

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Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., threw cold water on President Donald Trump's insistence that Republicans move to nationalize elections. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

But Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., rejected the notion. He said that while he was supportive of only citizens voting and showing identification at polling places to do so, he was not in "favor of federalizing elections."

"That's a constitutional issue. You gotta be a citizen to vote in our elections," Thune said.

Trump’s ability to morph and shape the election landscape runs into constitutional barriers, notably that elections are run by state and local officials in all 50 states. The federal government has a limited role in that process.

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President Donald Trump arrives ahead of the wedding of Dan Scavino, White House deputy chief of staff, and Erin Elmore, the director of Art in Embassies at the U.S. Department of State, at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., Feb. 1, 2026. (Nathan Howard/Reuters)

Thune also noted that echoes of the idea were once pushed by congressional Democrats years ago — something that Senate Republicans resoundingly crushed.

"But there are other things that the Dems had in their proposal to federalize elections which are really bad outcomes for the country," he said. "I'm a big believer in decentralized, distributed power. And I think, you know, it's harder to hack 50 election systems than it is to hack one."

Congressional Republicans strongly pushed back against pushes by their counterparts to pass election reform legislation, notably the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the For the People Act, which they argued at the time would effectively nationalize elections and give Democrats control of the election system across the country.

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Two Democratic congressional leaders stand side by side at podiums during a news conference inside the U.S. Capitol.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., hold a joint news conference at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 8, 2026. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

Trump’s suggestion came after the FBI raided an election hub in Fulton County, Ga., where federal law enforcement officials were authorized to seize election records, voting rolls and other data tied to the 2020 election.

It also comes as congressional Republicans wrestle with the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, which previously passed the House but has not gotten a vote in the Senate.

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That legislation would require states to obtain proof of citizenship in-person when people register to vote and remove noncitizens from voter rolls. A modified version of the bill gaining steam among conservatives would require photo ID when voting.

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., slammed Trump’s comments and the SAVE Act and affirmed that the bill would never pass through the Senate.

"Now as for the SAVE Act itself: it has nothing to do with protecting our elections and everything to do with federalizing voter suppression," Schumer said. "The SAVE Act is nothing more than Jim Crow 2.0."

Thune rejected the idea, citing constitutional concerns about federalizing elections

Alex Miller is a writer for Fox News Digital covering the U.S. Senate.

Thune rejects Trump's call to nationalize elections, warns Dems tried the same