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10-01-2026
WASHINGTON: The US House of Representatives on Thursday is expected to overturn two vetoes issued by President Donald Trump in a rare split between the Republican president and his allies in Congress.
It is an unusual challenge from the Republican-controlled Congress, which has largely backed Trump during his first year in office as he has canceled billions of dollars in spending, hiked tariffs and taken action in other areas that are usually handled on Capitol Hill.
Last month, Trump vetoed a $1.3 billion drinking-water project in Colorado, saying the local community should fund it, and a $14 million project in the Everglades National Park that would have benefited the Miccosukee Tribe of Native Americans, who fought an immigration detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz” that was later shut down.
Colorado Democrats have accused Trump of using the veto to punish the state for imprisoning Tina Peters, a former election official found guilty of tampering with voting machines in the 2020 presidential election.
In order to override Trump’s vetoes, both the House and the Senate need to clear a two-thirds supermajority. The House is expected to meet that threshold, while it is not certain whether the Senate will hold a vote.
This would not be Congress’ first break with Trump.
The Senate has rebuffed Trump’s calls to change rules that give Democrats some power in that chamber.
Lawmakers also voted overwhelmingly to force the release of files in the federal investigation of the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Trump supported their release once it became clear the vote would succeed.
Trump vetoed 10 bills in his first term as president. Congress only overrode one veto.
Last month, US President Donald Trump vetoed a major drinking water project in Colorado, drawing immediate condemnation from Colorado Republican lawmaker Lauren Boebert, a former loyal MAGA ally who also recently challenged Trump over the Jeffrey Epstein files. The White House announced Trump’s veto of the Finish the Arkansas Valley Conduit (AVC) Act, which was approved unanimously by both the House of Representatives and the Senate, and a second measure affecting a Florida project, late on Tuesday. They were the first two vetoes of Trump’s second term.
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The veto of the Colorado project came after Trump’s vow to retaliate against the state for keeping his ally Tina Peters in prison, despite his attempt to pardon her earlier in the month, and Boebert’s action to force the release of the government’s files on the late convicted sexual offender Epstein.
Peters, a former Colorado county clerk, is serving a nine-year prison term after being convicted on state charges for illegally tampering with voting machines in the 2020 presidential election. Trump’s pardon covers only federal charges and the state has refused to release Peters.
Boebert, who sponsored the bill, condemned Trump’s veto of what she called a “completely non-controversial, bipartisan bill” in a statement on social media, adding her hope is that “this veto has nothing to do with political retaliation for calling out corruption and demanding accountability.”
The bill was aimed at funding a decades-long project to bring safe drinking water to 39 communities in Colorado’s Eastern Plains, where the groundwater is high in salt, and wells sometimes unleash radioactivity into the water supply. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
