President Donald Trump derailed a housing overhaul that he was set to sign into law Wednesday, canceling a signing ceremony for the broadly popular bipartisan bill until Congress passes an election security measure.

Trump had been scheduled to sign the bill, which passed the Senate Monday and House Tuesday with wide margins, during a Capitol ceremony.

But in a pair of social media posts prior to the event, he derided the overhaul aimed at lowering housing costs as “minor” before refusing to sign it entirely.

“Today’s Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social.

The controversial SAVE America Act, a top priority for Trump, addresses the extremely rare phenomenon of noncitizen voting. Republican senators have told Trump there are not enough votes in the chamber for it to pass.

The housing bill’s Senate sponsors, Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott and ranking Democrat Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, sought to lower the costs of housing construction by removing regulatory barriers, expanding the uses of federal housing grants and banning institutional investors from buying single-family homes.

Scott, a South Carolina Republican, lauded the bill Tuesday as not only bipartisan, but nonpartisan, addressing universal needs.

Republican leaders framed the measure as addressing affordability, which is expected to be a key issue in November’s midterm elections amid stubborn inflation.

The measure, which combined elements of proposals in each chamber, appeared on a fast track to becoming law after the Senate approved it 85-5 Monday and the House voted 358-32 Tuesday. The White House had said Trump supported the bill.

The House opponents were virtually all from a group of conservatives, led by Florida’s Anna Paulina Luna, who said she would oppose all legislation from the Senate, and even some House rules resolutions, until the Senate passed Trump’s elections security measure.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said during a Wednesday morning press conference that he spoke with the president earlier in the day and that he is going to delay signing the housing bill until Congress approves a grant program for elections through the complex budget reconciliation process. That’s the same procedure the GOP used to enact its “big, beautiful” law and $70 billion for immigration enforcement.

“You have to put it on a reconciliation bill,” he said. “We believe that if you create a grant program that ties it to reconciling the budget and you allow blue states, if they come to their senses and they want to avail themselves of election integrity proposals and ideas and policies, they can draw down from a federal fund and use those funds. We’re willing to invest heavily in that.”

Johnson said he told Trump that Republicans in Congress can enact that policy if they “stand together.”

“As you know he has a window of time before he has to sign a bill and he’s going to use a bit more of that window of time,” Johnson said. “And we’re going to go through this together.”

Johnson said he expects Trump to sign the housing bill within the 10-day window.

The U.S. House cleared a bipartisan housing policy overhaul Tuesday, aiming to lower the cost of homeownership as members of both parties attempt to focus on affordability issues ahead of November’s midterm elections.

The House passed the bill, 358-32, sending it to President Donald Trump’s desk a day after the Senate’s 85-5 vote. The White House has said the administration supports the measure and Trump’s aides would advise he sign it.

The bill would reduce some regulatory hurdles, including environmental reviews, to home construction and expand the possible uses of federal housing funds. It includes a high-profile provision to ban private equity firms from buying single-family homes.

The bill would allow money from the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Community Development Block Grant program to be used for construction of new affordable housing. It would also tie the amount some cities and states receive from the $3.3 billion grant program to their rates of affordable housing construction.

Increasing worries over cost of living

The action from Congress this week reflects a bipartisan focus on affordability, as both parties have sought to address voters’ increasing concerns with the cost of living that has been consistently rising since the start of the decade.

Margaret Spellings, the president and CEO of the Bipartisan Policy Center, said at a housing policy conference hosted by the Washington, D.C., think tank that the rising cost of housing was due to a lack of supply.

“During the past two decades, the U.S. has simply not built enough housing to meet demand,” she said. “This supply-demand imbalance has led to soaring prices and rents in communities across the nation, with millions of households struggling to make their payments and unable to achieve the American dream of home ownership.”

She added that the issue had animated policymakers at the national, state and local levels.

“Housing is now a top-tier issue here in Washington and in state capitols and city halls all across our country,” she said.

Broad consensus

The measure includes provisions from earlier proposals in both chambers, reflecting a consensus not only between the two major parties but between the two chambers of Congress that often cannot agree on how to approach even broadly supported legislation.

Sen. Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican who chairs the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, lauded the measure’s broad appeal in a pre-recorded message to the BPC conference.

The bill was nonpartisan, reflecting “advocacy on behalf of common sense,” he said.

“But it does take a bipartisan coalition who puts America first,” he said. “Your work encouraging all of us to put the country first, to put first-time homebuyers first, has resulted in legislation passed through the Senate yet again, and this time is on a path straight to the president’s desk.”

The committee’s ranking Democrat, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, called it a “BIG WIN to build more housing” in a post to social media Tuesday.

“I’ve worked on this bill for over a year,” she wrote. “It’s still possible to find bipartisan, common ground on legislation that actually helps the American people.”

Conservatives revolt 

Despite the bill’s broad appeal, a bloc of House conservatives frustrated with the Senate’s inability to pass a Trump-supported bill to require photo ID at polling places and other measures they say are important to secure elections, mounted a last-minute objection to the housing bill.

Florida Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna was the most vocal member of the opposition Tuesday, pledging to vote against other bills and House rules resolutions until the Senate passed the elections security measure, titled the SAVE America Act, whose proponents have noted would restrict noncitizen voting, which is already illegal and extremely rare.

“I will be voting no and oppose other bills AND rules until we fight for SAVE America Act,” Luna wrote on social media Tuesday afternoon, well after the bill had been scheduled for a floor vote. “That means if House GOP leadership chooses today to move the SENATE HOUSING BILL under suspension (getting rid of our house rules) I will vote to shut the floor down. I AM NOT THE ONLY ONE.”

Kris Seals, a Brookfield alderman, has resigned following public outcry over anti-Muslim social media posts he made. Though Seals initially resisted calls for his resignation, he has since backpedaled and apologized for his comments, which discussed violence against Muslims. 

“I would like to apologize to the Muslim community for my insensitive and inappropriate statements I made online,” Seals said in an emailed statement which was shared by Brookfield City Attorney Jenna Merten, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. 

Shortly after Seals was reelected in an uncontested race on April 7, Fox 6 Milwaukee reported on numerous posts the alder made on LinkedIn. “They will take over your country with out (sic) one shot,” read one of Seals’ posts. “They will out vote you in less then (sic) 30 years and then you will be living under Sharia Law.” Fox 6 Milwaukee said the posts were first noticed by a local resident who shared them with the TV news station. “They are a sick religion,” Seals wrote in  another post. “This must stop. deport them all.” In yet another post Seals wrote “It’s time to wipe out the immigrants from Britain and all of the EU.” Another of his  posts referred to shooting Muslims and Somalis with  “bacon rapped (sic) bullets,” topped off with laughing emojis. 

Seals had also made a post reading “Obummer is not the President anymore! So Presidential immunity is Mute. Hang him for treason,” and another one suggesting that criminals should be shot twice in the head to save “the people tons of money in court cost and prison cost, also eliminating the dems from becoming involved in trying to save their voter base.” Images of another post have been shared with the Examiner, with the posts alleging that “every blue state has Billions in fraud” which Seals re-posted and commented that, “I think it’s way past time for Public Executions.”

Fox6 Milwaukee reporters questioned Seals at his home. Seals said “it’s obnoxious, these people,” referring to what he called “extreme Muslims” and asking the reporter to “put that word in there, because it’s not all Muslims.” Grinning, Seals admitted to making the posts about bacon-wrapped bullets, a discriminatory trope mocking the Muslim prohibition on eating pork. Seals told the reporters that the only post he regretted was the one calling for criminals to be shot. “Sometimes we say a lot of things online that we don’t necessarily mean,” Seals said. He later claimed that his LinkedIn posts were  bringing attention to important issues. “Those are problems,” said Seals. “I have a right to say how I feel.”

The comments caused an uproar and Muslim community organizations called for Seals to resign. “Public officials take an oath to serve all constituents, not to demonize them,” said Robert McCaw, government affairs director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “Seals’ violent and dehumanizing remarks targeting Muslims and immigrants are not just offensive, they are dangerous. This rhetoric fuels hate, legitimizes discrimination, and puts real people at risk. It is fundamentally incompatible with the responsibilities of public office.” 

Seals said in his resignation statement that he spoke with a member of the Muslim community. “I appreciate they are willing to forgive me for the rude statements I made,” he said. “I look forward to meeting with them and to get an even better understanding of the Community.”

The common council will now need to determine how to fill Seals’ empty seat. It wasn’t the first time Brookfield’s common council had to contend with inflammatory comments made by Seals. 

In 2023, Seals drew attention for speaking against a proposed affordable housing development in his wealthy, mostly white suburb. “The problem that I have is the future of Brookfield,” said Seals. “What we are trying to do is step down to a West Allis or a Wauwatosa. No, we’re Brookfield. We don’t step down to allow the people who can’t afford to live in Brookfield to come in, because then we become West Allis, then we become Wauwatosa. This is not what Brookfield is. I’ve been here 60 years, this is not Brookfield.” Seals also said people who want to live in Brookfield need to “put your nose to the grindstone” until they can afford to live there. 

An attempt to censure Seals for his comments on affordable housing failed, with 16 local residents appearing to speak in support of the alder. One woman called his opposition to the housing project “exemplary.”

Brookfield Ald. Michael Hallquist pushed for Seals’ censure in 2023. In an emailed statement to Wisconsin Examiner, Hallquist applauded his common council colleague’s resignation over three years later.

“First and foremost, I want to reassure the Muslim members of our community that you belong here, you are loved, and you are every much as Brookfield as my family is,” said Hallquist. “You are our neighbors and we will continue to show up for you.”

Hallquist said that Seals “represents an ever-decreasing attitude of hate and intolerance in our community. While I appreciate his apology, I hope he sincerely intends to learn more from his neighbors on his pathway to forgiveness, and I wish him well on that journey. It speaks volumes to the kindness of our Muslim community to offer him the opportunity to do-so.” Hallquist concluded that, “Brookfield is what we make it, so I hope we continue to create a culture for our city where everyone feels safe, appreciated, and welcome.”

This article has been updated with comment from Ald. Michael Hallquist.