{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.thune.senate.gov/news/press-releases/thune-congress-has-opportunities-to-deliver-more-if-democrats-are-willing-to-work/", "Thune: Congress Has Opportunities to Deliver More if Democrats Are Willing to Work", "2026-09-15", "2026", "2026-09", "Republican", "Senate", "SD", "John Thune", "T000250", "www.thune.senate.gov", "thune", "https://www.thune.senate.gov/news/press-releases/", "scraper", "Click here to watch the video.\n\nWASHINGTON \u2014 U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) today spoke at a press conference with Senate Republican leadership:\n\nThune\u2019s remarks below (as delivered):\n\n\u201cGood afternoon, everyone.\n\n\u201cWe have a big, I would say, but limited opportunity to get some things done here over the course of the next several weeks and, I would say, starting with the Clarity Act, which we\u2019re going to vote on this afternoon.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019ll be a procedural vote, and we\u2019ll find out if Democrats actually want to pass this legislation and whether or not they\u2019re willing to take yes for an answer.\n\n\u201cBecause our members who\u2019ve been negotiating this \u2013 Chairman Scott, Chairman Boozman, Senator Lummis, others \u2013 have been very involved now, literally for months, in trying to come up with legislation that would address the Democrat concerns.\n\n\u201cAnd they have made myriad, I would say, concessions to the Democrats \u2013 I think 126 different changes to this legislation since it was first introduced \u2013 trying to accommodate some of the Democrat concerns.\n\n\u201cSo this is, it\u2019s time to vote.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s time to put up or shut up.\n\n\u201cAnd so this afternoon we\u2019re going to have that vote.\n\n\u201cAnd then, I would say, on the Protect College Sports Act, that will follow after, depending how the Clarity vote goes, but that\u2019s also legislation that has had a lot of work put into it over the past several months, and I think most people acknowledge that the current landscape in college sports is a mess. It needs to be addressed.\n\n\u201cChairman Cruz and others have worked diligently, Senator Schmitt, coming up with a product that I think is a vast improvement, and of course worked with Democrats as well on trying to get that in a form that we could move it across the floor.\n\n\u201cSo we will see if there are 60 votes on a procedural vote on that issue as well.\n\n\u201cAnd I would also add to that list, permitting reform.\n\n\u201cSenator Capito and her team have been working with the Democrats, and we\u2019ll find out soon whether or not we can.\n\n\u201cThat is also something that has, I think, broad bipartisan support, and she\u2019s done a great job of negotiating those issues.\n\n\u201cAnd I\u2019m hopeful, frankly, that we could get that up on the floor and voted on, because I think that is an important and consequential piece of legislation that\u2019s really important to our country\u2019s economy.\n\n\u201cAnd then finally, I would say something that\u2019s really important in farm country is the farm bill, and there\u2019s going to be hopefully committee action on that this week as well.\n\n\u201cAnd so those are all issues that are sort of hovering out there right now, in addition to some of the nominations that we\u2019ll deal with, both on the judicial and the executive calendars as well.\n\n\u201cBut my hope would be that this can be a productive few weeks here \u2013 and it\u2019s going to depend largely, I think, on whether or not the Democrats want to play ball, whether they want to get some things done, or whether they want to play politics.\n\n\u201cAnd we\u2019ll find that out soon enough.\u201d", 1, "2026-09-16T09:43:13Z", "2026-09-16T09:44:22Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.thune.senate.gov/news/press-releases/thune-congress-has-opportunities-to-deliver-more-if-democrats-are-willing-to-work/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.7337660063058138, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}