Senate Republicans breathed new life into the SAVE America Act late Monday, even after a string of setbacks and a revolt from several GOP senators threatened to leave the election integrity measure stalled for good.
The fight unfolded during the Senate’s overnight “vote-a-rama” on Republicans’ $70 billion immigration enforcement package, where lawmakers made two separate attempts to attach the SAVE America Act, a House-passed measure backed by President Donald Trump that would require proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections.
Both efforts ultimately failed because they needed to overcome the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster hurdle, but one of the votes gave conservatives fresh optimism.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., first tried to add a revised version of the SAVE America Act that included several provisions Trump had pushed for months, including a ban on men competing in women’s sports.
That proposal ran into opposition from four Republicans. Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Thom Tillis, R-N.C., joined Democrats in voting against the amendment, denying Republicans even the 50 votes they would have needed to begin a talking filibuster strategy.
A second attempt led by Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, fared better.
Collins switched her vote and backed the original SAVE America Act, allowing the amendment to reach 50 votes. With Vice President JD Vance available to cast a tie-breaking vote, conservatives argued the bill would have cleared the chamber if not for Senate rules.
Lee celebrated the outcome on X while the vote-a-rama continued.
“That means that but for the Zombie Filibuster, the House-passed SAVE America Act would now be on its way to the White House for President Trump’s signature,” Lee said.
The vote marked the strongest showing yet for legislation that has languished in the Senate for months despite strong support from conservatives and Trump allies.
Lawmakers like Lee have repeatedly urged Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., to force Democrats into a talking filibuster, arguing Republicans could eventually pass the bill with a simple majority.
Thune has resisted that approach out of concern that Democrats could use the process to flood the Senate with amendments aimed at reshaping the bill or undermining other pieces of Trump’s agenda.
Republicans staged an extended floor debate over the SAVE America Act in March, but momentum behind the effort faded in the months that followed.
Another option would be eliminating the legislative filibuster altogether, something Trump has called for at various points during his second term.
But Republicans remain divided on changing Senate rules, with several senators worried such a move would come back to haunt the party when Democrats eventually reclaim the majority.
Trump has also turned his attention to Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough after she ruled the SAVE America Act could not be included in the immigration package under reconciliation rules requiring only a simple majority.
The president has repeatedly urged Thune to remove her.
“We have every right to change her, and should do so, IMMEDIATELY,” Trump said on Truth Social. “As long as she’s there, we will never get our desperately needed, SAVE AMERICA ACT, approved, and put into full force and effect!”
Thune has shown little appetite for that option.
“That’s not a new request, as you all know, and as is typically the case, the parliamentarian, the rulings break both ways,” Thune said. “And, you know, we lose a few, we win a few, but that’s been true when Democrats have been in the majority, too.”
For now, the late-night vote gave supporters of the SAVE America Act something they have lacked for months: signs of life.
Photo of harrowing knife attack in Belfast, Northern Ireland last night via Visegrad24
Restore Britain leader Rupert Lowe has demanded full transparency from police after an excruciatingly barbaric knife attack—and apparent attempted beheading—in north Belfast left a man critically injured and reignited public anger over violent crime, mass immigration, two-tier policing, and the growing sense that British victims are being failed by the state.
The attack, according to local reports, took place shortly after 10:30 p.m. Monday on Kinnaird Avenue in north Belfast—the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, which is one of the four countries that make up the United Kingdom.
The attacker, according to reports, is a Somali citizen. Other reports suggest he is a Sudanese citizen.
However, several reports describe the migrant as Sudanese.
The Police Service of Northern Ireland said officers responded to reports of a stabbing, arrested one man, and confirmed that another man had been taken to hospital with serious injuries.
Graphic footage posted online appeared to show the attacker—an African man— straddling the bloodied victim in the middle of the road while armed with a knife. Witnesses could be heard screaming as the attacker repeatedly struck toward the victim’s head and neck.
“He’s trying to cut his head off,” bystanders shouted in the horrifying clip as members of the public eventually rushed in to stop the assault.
The footage spread rapidly across social media, shocking viewers across Britain and Ireland. The Belfast Telegraph reported that police recovered a small Stanley-type knife.
The suspect’s immigration status, or further details about the circumstances of the attack is currently unknown.
A PSNI spokesperson said officers were called to Kinnaird Avenue “following the report of a stabbing incident shortly after 10.30pm on Monday 8th June.”
“A man has been arrested in relation to the incident and is in police custody while a second man has been taken to hospital with serious injuries,” police said. Officers remained in the area conducting inquiries and appealed for witnesses, dash-cam footage, and CCTV. Police asked anyone with information to contact investigators on the non-emergency number 101.
Local politicians reacted with horror. Lagan Valley MP Sorcha Eastwood said people were waking up to “absolutely horrifying news of a savage and barbaric attack in Belfast.”
“I can’t get that footage out of my mind and I’m holding the victim in prayer,” Eastwood wrote. “The community is in shock and my thoughts are with those first responders on the scene who courageously pulled the attacker from the victim and to the police who ran straight into it.”
Deputy leader of Northern Ireland’s Alliance Party Eóin Tennyson said the footage showed “some of the most depraved and barbaric violence I have seen in a long time.” He said the individual responsible must face “the full force of the law.”
Councillor Paul McCusker described the scenes as “horrific” and praised residents who intervened. “The bravery of those residents was commendable,” he said. But for Lowe and many on the British national right, familiar words of shock and sympathy are no longer enough. They argue that Britain has reached a point where the public is repeatedly shown scenes of extreme violence, only to be told to wait patiently while authorities withhold basic facts.
In a video statement posted to X, Lowe said he had watched the Belfast footage and described it as “the most horrific” he had seen.
“Good morning everybody. I’ve just watched the most horrific footage from Northern Ireland, from Belfast of one man on top of another with a knife obviously screaming and shouting,” Lowe said.
He praised members of the public who intervened, calling them “patriots.” “I don’t know what has happened to the victim but it didn’t look good,” he said. Lowe then issued a direct demand to police. “I now call for the police with full transparency to disclose the ethnicity and immigration status of the person who perpetrated the attack,” he said.
That demand has become central to the political backlash. Critics argue that when authorities refuse to disclose basic details in cases of extreme violence, they deepen public distrust and create the impression that facts are being managed to protect the political narrative around immigration and integration.
Online claims about the suspect’s background circulated widely after the video emerged, but police have not confirmed those claims. Lowe’s argument is that the public should not be forced to rely on rumor when police could establish the truth openly.
Transparency, for Restore Britain supporters, is not optional. They argue that the public has a right to know whether violent crimes are connected to broader failures of immigration policy, border control, asylum enforcement, or foreign criminality.
“This is disappointingly a growing trend which is affecting all of us,” Lowe said. “It stems from immigration largely.”
He also attacked the “whole industry” built around human rights law and legal complexity, accusing figures such as Keir Starmer of placing elite legal doctrines above the safety of ordinary British people.
The Belfast attack comes after the murder of Henry Nowak in Southampton became a national symbol of two-tier policing and institutional failure. Nowak, an 18-year-old white British student, was stabbed and then handcuffed after his killer falsely claimed he had been racially abused.
Nowak’s death and the Belfast attack now sit inside the same broader argument: British victims are too often denied the urgency and institutional protection that other victims receive instantly.
Lowe pointed directly to the Nowak case. “We can quite clearly see with the recent tragic death of Henry Nowak we can see two-tier policing,” he said.
The concern is not merely that violent crimes are occurring. It is that the state appears increasingly nervous about naming patterns, identifying suspects, discussing immigration status, or admitting when political correctness has corrupted public safety.
That silence is part of the crisis. If the public sees repeated violence, watches officials withhold basic facts, and hears critics smeared for asking questions, trust in the justice system will continue to collapse.
Lowe said Britain needs “total transparency” because truth is the only way to rebuild public confidence. “If you have transparency, you have truth,” he said. “And from truth you can actually start to deal with the issues that are causing the problem,” Lowe added.
He warned that without honesty, Britain will face growing distrust and a deepening sense that ordinary people are unsafe in their own towns and streets. “Until we have that I’m afraid we’re going to continue to all of us suffer from increasing distrust, increasing a feeling of a lack of safety,” he said.
“We want our high trust society back and we’re not gonna get it back by people being deceitful,” Lowe said. “We need honesty. We need truth. We need authenticity. And we need openness.”
That phrase—a high-trust society—has become central to the Restore Britain message. Supporters argue that mass immigration, weak borders, imported crime, and elite denial of the important problems have damaged the social trust that once made British communities safer and more cohesive.
The Belfast attack is now being viewed by many as another test of whether the authorities will treat public concern as legitimate or dismiss it as dangerous. The answer, for right-thinking people, must begin with releasing the facts.
Restore Britain’s argument is exceedingly simple: violent foreign criminals should be deported, mass immigration must be brought under control, and police should stop treating transparency as a threat to public order.
The PSNI investigation remains ongoing, and the suspect has not been publicly identified. But the political pressure is already building.
As the victim remains in hospital, Lowe and Restore Britain are demanding that police tell the public who carried out the attack, what his background is, and whether immigration status is relevant.
For the growing number of critics of Britain’s current trajectory, the issue is far bigger than Belfast or Henry Nowak’s tragedy. It is about whether the British state still has the will to protect its own people—or whether it will continue sacrificing them on the altar of multiculturalism and ceaseless mass migration from cultures entirely alien to Western civilisation.
A historically strong earthquake struck off Cuba’s northwest coast on Monday, according to official reports, shaking parts of Cuba, Mexico and Florida that are typically not prone to quakes.
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) measured the quake at a magnitude 6.1 at a shallow depth of 26 km (16 miles) and its epicenter 104 km west-northwest of Mantua, Cuba, about two to four hours by car from the capital Havana.
Monday’s earthquake was unusual for this area of the Caribbean, said Paul Earle, a seismologist at the USGS, noting that the quake occurred within a tectonic plate, where earthquakes are usually more scattered and less frequent than when they occur along plate boundaries.
On Monday, the Supreme Court vacated a lower court ruling that upheld Biden Energy Department regulations that would outlaw gas stoves and water heaters in Americans’ homes and require homeowners with these to either renovate their homes or switch to electric appliances.
In American Gas Association, et al. V. Dept. Of Energy, et al, the District of Columbia’s district court upheld the Biden Administration’s regulations banning the use of non-condensing appliances, effectively eliminating gas furnaces and water heaters from the marketplace.
In response, the American Gas Association, American Public Gas Association and National Propane Gas Association asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the decision. In their petition to the high court for a writ of certiorari, they stressed the consequences of allowing the lower court’s decision to stand:
“The Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) prohibits the Department of Energy from adopting efficiency standards that ban consumer access to appliances with distinct performance characteristics.
“In this case, the Department adopted standards abolishing gas-fired furnaces and water heaters that work with existing venting systems in millions of homes and buildings across the country. These standards will force consumers to either renovate their homes or switch to electric appliances.”
"The Department may not adopt standards that effectively eliminate from the market products that have distinct 'performance characteristics,'" Solicitor General John Sauer wrote in a brief to the high court.
On Monday, in apparent concurrence with Sauer’s analysis, the Supreme Court granted the petition, vacated the ruling and sent the case back to the D.C. court, ordering it to reconsider its decision supporting the Biden Administration regulations:
“The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted. The judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit for further consideration in light of the position asserted by the Solicitor General in his brief for the United States filed on April 28, 2026.”
