The SAVE Act, which Trump prefers to call the SAVE America Act because it sounds better even if it’s wrong, a concern he doesn’t share even though he is “real smart” if he does say so himself, is bad law that does significant damage to a great many American citizens’ ability to vote. Had the bill merely required the showing of government issued identification by voters, it would be overwhelmingly popular, even if the fringe left would still argue it was too burdensome.

But that’s not all the bill requires. Beyond transgender prohibitions having nothing to do with voting, it would require voters to prove their citizenship with either a passport or birth certificate. That’s a grave burden for a lot of people, and an impossibility for others, even though they are very much Americans and have a right to vote. And it gets worse for people, like married women, whose current name on their government issued identification doesn’t match the name on their birth certificate.

What the law would do is make it far more difficult, if not impossible, for some Americans to vote, and Trump assumes those people won’t vote for him. That makes it a good law. Good for Trump, as Chip Roy figured when he proposed it. But it has no chance of making it through the Senate, and that’s where Texas Senator John Cornyn, who is in a heated battle for the Republican nomination with indicted Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, comes in.

Cornyn wants to keep his job, and wants Trump to endorse his candidacy. Trump wants the SAVE (America) Act passed, and the only hope of it happening requires the Senate Republican majority killing the filibuster. Cornyn has been a long-time defender of the filibuster, recognizing that it’s the only thing the party in control of Congress and the presidency from running roughshod over the opposition.

Cornyn is now willing to sell his soul to get Trump’s endorsement.

For many years, I believed that if the US Senate scrapped the filibuster, Texas and our nation would stand to lose more than we would gain.

My fellow conservatives and I have proudly used the 60-vote threshold to protect the country from all sorts of bad ideas and dangerous policies.

But when the reality on the ground changes, leaders must take stock and adapt.

Today, Democrats are weaponizing the Senate’s rules to block the SAVE America Act, defund the Department of Homeland Security and hurt the American people — all to spite President Donald Trump.

But they say openly that if these same rules ever get in Democrats’ way, they won’t hesitate to rip them up.

A rule is only a rule if both sides follow it.

The Democrats tried, and failed, to nuke the filibuster to push their legislation through. Cornyn’s argument is that the Democrats will make it happen if they gain control of Congress, so the Republicans should do it first. And according to Trump, that spells the difference in the midterms.

Trump called on Republicans to pass the SAVE America Act in a speech at his golf club in Doral, Florida, on Monday, arguing, “I don’t think we should approve anything until this is approved.”

“It will guarantee the midterms,” he said. “If you don’t get it, big trouble, my opinion.”

Trump’s belief is grounded in his delusion that the Dems have rigged elections and illegals are voting against him. And to appease this fallacy, Cornyn flipped.

After careful consideration, I support whatever changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary for us to get the SAVE America Act and homeland security funding past the Democrats’ obstruction, through the Senate, and on the president’s desk for his signature.

And should Cornyn’s flip-flop coincidentally get him Trump’s endorsement, well, that would be nice.

Speaking to reporters after the op-ed published Wednesday, Cornyn batted down suggestions he had changed his position on the filibuster just to try to get Trump’s endorsement.

“Hopefully the president likes what he sees, but this has really been sort of an evolution of my own thinking,” he told reporters.

It is by no means clear that Cornyn’s flipping will mean that the Republicans have the votes to nuke the filibuster, meaning that Cornyn’s pandering to Trump’s demand will ultimately change nothing. Cornyn will get his desired endorsement and the filibuster will remain intact.

Thune played down the Texan’s 180 in comments to reporters Tuesday.

“Well, Sen. Cornyn is one of 53 Republican senators, and the opposition to nuking the filibuster runs very, very deep in our conference,” he said.

Even one of the loudest Senate supporters of filibuster changes, Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, stopped short of characterizing Cornyn’s U-turn as reflecting a dramatic shift for the Senate GOP as a whole.

When the Democrats whined about their inability to enact their progressive agenda because of the filibuster, it should have been overwhelmingly clear that the handful of senators willing to quietly be the adults in the room even though they otherwise pandered to their political base understood that without it, the tyranny of the majority would prevail. To the extent that Senator John Cornyn once stood with the grown-ups, he sold it for Trump’s blessing. So much for principles. So much for America.