US President Donald Trump has vetoed two bipartisan bills for the first time in his second term, blocking a Colorado water project and the expansion of a Native American reservation. Both measures would now need two thirds support in the House and Senate to become law without his signature.
One vetoed bill, the Finish the Arkansas Valley Conduit Act, sought to complete a decades old pipeline to supply clean water to Colorado’s Eastern Plains. Trump told Congress the project was too costly and said he was protecting taxpayers from funding what he called expensive and unreliable policies. The plan, first proposed in the 1960s under John F Kennedy, had unanimous backing in both chambers, including support from Colorado’s Democratic senators and Republicans Lauren Boebert and Jeff Hurd.
Boebert, once a close Trump ally but now at odds with him over the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, vowed on social media that the fight over the water project is not over. She was one of four Republicans who pushed the Justice Department to release remaining Epstein records, which Trump had tried for months to keep sealed before eventually agreeing to a disclosure bill.
Trump also vetoed the Miccosukee Reserved Area Amendments Act, which would have expanded the Miccosukee Tribe’s control over Osceola Camp in Florida’s Everglades National Park. The tribe had recently joined a lawsuit against a nearby immigration detention centre nicknamed Alligator Alcatraz, a facility a federal judge ordered largely dismantled.
In rejecting the bill, Trump argued the Miccosukee were not authorised to inhabit Osceola Camp and said his administration would not spend taxpayer money on what he called projects for special interests, especially groups he views as misaligned with his immigration policies. The moves underline how rarely presidents use the veto power: Trump blocked 10 bills in his first term, while his predecessor Joe Biden vetoed 13 during his four years in office.
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