Trump’s one-word cap post reveals his sudden lame-duck role after losing Congress

With Democrats poised to take control of both the House and Senate and cement his status as a lame duck, President Donald Trump is threatening to respond by using the one remaining lever of power available to him by rejecting legislation presented to him by the new Democratic-led Congress en masse.

As election results filtered in showing Republican candidates for the upper chamber losing to their Democratic challengers in Texas, Nebraska, Iowa, South Carolina and other traditional strongholds, Trump posted an image of one of his iconic red baseball caps to his Truth Social account.

On the hat was just one word: “Veto.”

The monosyllabic threat was a reference to the president’s power to reject legislation passed by both houses of Congress and presented to him for his signature, an authority Trump has exercised a total of 12 times across his two terms in the White House.

He elaborated on the threat during a phone interview with Fox News just after midnight on Wednesday, telling anchor Brett Baier: “The power of veto is one of the stronger powers that a president has, and they'll send over things that are insane, and I'll veto them. And after a couple of months of vetoes, they'll call and they'll say, "How do we get this stuff done?" And we'll work together,” he said.

Trump added that he has “a lot of friends who are Democrats” and suggested that members of the incoming majority “want to talk.”

“That's the power of veto, and the power of veto is, you know, impervious,” he said.

Should Trump exercise his veto power, Congress can still force bills into law by voting to override the veto by two-thirds majorities.

Most attempts to override Trump’s vetos have failed, but Congress did successfully override a last-minute veto of the annual National Defense Authorization Act during Trump’s last weeks in office at the end of his first term.

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