NEW YORK — Despite naming a chief of staff who is expected to bring a new sense of discipline to the White House, President Trump resorted to his old Twitter playbook Saturday, attacking Senate Republicans who he said “look like fools’’ — even as he demonstrated an uncertain understanding of the legislative process.
In a series of early morning messages, the president criticized the Senate’s filibuster rules, saying they were hampering his agenda.
“Republican Senate must get rid of 60 vote NOW! It is killing the R Party, allows 8 Dems to control country. 200 Bills sit in Senate. A JOKE!’’ Trump wrote in the flurry of Twitter posts that started shortly after 7 a.m.
It was not clear why he was focused on the filibuster rule, a parliamentary delay tactic that requires 60 votes to overcome. Republicans have a 52-seat majority in the Senate. A proposal this week to repeal portions of the health care law, as long demanded by Trump, required a simple 51-vote majority to pass and still failed.
Nonetheless, Trump plowed on, saying “many great Republican bills will never pass,’’ including health care, under the filibuster rule.
“Mitch M, go to 51 Votes NOW and WIN. IT’S TIME!’’ he said on Twitter. “Republicans in the Senate will NEVER win if they don’t go to a 51 vote majority NOW. They look like fools and are just wasting time......’’
Antonia Ferrier, a spokeswoman for Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican who is the Senate majority leader, declined to comment on Trump’s posts.
But McConnell’s former chief of staff, Josh Holmes, cited Trump’s tweets Saturday as he sardonically suggested a “search for the idiot who keeps putting the President on irrelevant and counterproductive crusades,’’ he wrote.
The Senate this year temporarily changed its rules to allow Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, to be confirmed by a simple majority. But historically, and facing increasingly narrow elections that can flip control of the Senate every few years, most senators have opposed permanently jettisoning the rule that allows the minority party to indefinitely obstruct something that has majority support.
In another tweet from the president, Trump hinted that he may end a key Affordable Care Act subsidy that makes insurance accessible to poorer Americans, a move that could critically destabilize health insurance exchanges.
The administration has previously floated the idea to halt subsidies that help insurers offset health care costs for low-income Americans, called a cost-sharing reduction. In a tweet on Saturday, Trump hinted at ending that program.
“If a new HealthCare Bill is not approved quickly, BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon!’’ the president said in a tweet.
It was unclear if Trump’s message means he also plans to directly target subsidies that are available to health insurance policies for some congressional staff members. The White House declined to comment further on Trump’s tweet.
Ending the cost-sharing subsidies, paid monthly to insurers, is one way that Trump could hasten the demise of the federal health care law without legislation, by prompting more companies to raise premiums in the individual market or stop offering coverage.
The president on Saturday also cited a “Fox and Friends’’ report that claimed Russia was behind an investigation last year that produced a dossier about alleged unseemly incidents in Trump’s past. He said the Fox report showed that “Russia was against Trump in the 2016 election’’ and again blasted the federal investigations into possible collusion between his campaign and Russia as a “witch hunt.’’
Late Friday, the White House announced that Trump would sign legislation that limits his power to lift sanctions against Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The White House had initially resisted the bill.
The president’s remarks on Twitter come as Republicans are increasingly critical of his behavior. His poll numbers are at historic lows, his legislative agenda is stalled, and his advisers appear to be busy plotting against one another.
Trump hoped to regain momentum by pushing out his top aide, Reince Priebus, and installing a retired four-star Marine general, John F. Kelly, to take command.
Elaine Duke was named acting Homeland Security secretary, replacing Kelly. She has the rare distinction of serving in high-level positions in three administrations.
She was Homeland Security undersecretary for management from 2008 to 2010, tapped by President George W. Bush and kept on by President Obama. After she headed her own business consulting firm in the Washington area for seven years, President Trump nominated her as deputy secretary, and the Senate approved her appointment 85-14.
It is far from certain that these moves will be enough to tame a dysfunctional White House.
“Everybody knows what needs to be done to fix it, and I think everybody is coming to accept that they’re not going to happen,’’ said Sara Fagen, a White House political director under President George W. Bush. “And the reason they’re not going to happen is the person at the top of the food chain is not going to change. This is the new normal. This goes down as one of the worst weeks he’s had politically and PR-wise, but I don’t think anything will change.’’
Material from Bloomberg News and the Associated Press was used in this report.
