Did Trump Just Veto His First Bills of a Second Term?

President Donald Trump has made the first vetoes of legislation since retaking the White House nearly a year ago, setting up a potential showdown with US lawmakers. The two bills he vetoed passed Congress with bipartisan support, meaning lawmakers could muster enough votes to override him in the new year. A Trump ally, and well-known Republican, Representative Lauren Boebert, sponsored one of the bills, which was aimed at cutting the amounts that communities in her home state of Colorado are paying toward a new water pipeline. The other bill would have supported a flooding mitigation project for a Native American tribe in Florida that had sued to stop construction of "Alligator Alcatraz". In a message to Congress, Trump called the Colorado plan economically unviable. "Enough is enough. My Administration is committed to preventing American taxpayers from funding expensive and unreliable policies," Trump said. He added the bill would have hurt repayments to the federal government for building the pipeline, which will bring fresh water to the eastern part of the state.. Boebert, one of a handful of conservative lawmakers to break with Trump and push for the release of the Epstein files this winter, responded to the veto with a post on X, writing: "This isn't over." "I sincerely hope this veto has nothing to do with political retaliation," she then said in a statement. Trump has also sparred with Colorado's political leaders over the imprisonment of Tina Peters, a 73-year-old county clerk who echoed false claims that the 2020 election was stolen and was convicted by both the state and US government for election security-related offences. Trump, who pardoned Peters of her federal charges this month, has called on the Colorado's Democratic governor, Jared Polis, to release her. Polis has said it is up to the courts to decide her case, which has become a rallying cry for Trump's Make America Great Again wing of the Republican party. "Free Tina Peters!" Trump posted on Truth Social on Monday, and wrote about Colorado officials: "I wish them only the worst. May they rot in Hell." The second bill he vetoed, the Miccosukee Reserved Area Act, would have required the Interior Department to help the tribe in Florida prevent flooding in a part of their community that has vulnerable infrastructure. In his veto message, Trump wrote that the Miccosukee had conducted "unauthorised" development on the land in question. The White House also alleged the tribe "actively sought to obstruct reasonable immigration policies that the American people decisively voted for when I was elected." The Miccosukee tribe took legal action against the Trump administration's construction of an immigration detention centre in the Florida Everglades known as "Alligator Alcatraz". In court filings, the tribe had argued it was uniquely impacted by the construction of the site, and its construction posed environmental risks.