In an interview with the Washington Examiner on Monday, Thune touted his “strong” communication with the incoming president that starkly contrasted the icy relationship that Thune’s predecessor, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), had with Trump during his first term.

“We were texting until midnight last night. I talked to him earlier today by phone. He’s obviously very engaged,” said Thune, seated in the office occupied by McConnell for 18 years. “We need him engaged because he’s going to be key to what the traffic will bear in both the House and Senate.”

Hours earlier, Congress made Trump’s Electoral College win official by certifying the results. It’s a normally mundane process that four years earlier was marred by the Capitol attack that further fractured McConnell’s relationship with Trump and prompted his wife, former Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, to quit the president’s Cabinet.

Thune’s remarks during his first full week on the job underscored the level of engagement he expects Trump will have to expend to deliver on his campaign promises, even with a GOP-controlled Congress and White House. Under no illusion of the challenges ahead to implement Trump’s ambitious agenda that includes contentious policies like taxes, energy, and immigration, Thune acknowledged that the “politics of it is challenging.”

Congress can roll many of Trump’s priorities into one or more so-called reconciliation bills that can usurp the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster. But Republican leaders in both chambers have little wiggle room for dissension among their ranks, and there are limitations under Senate rules to the policies that can be included.

Trump on Monday morning, following his late-night talk with Thune the day before, softened his approach for one big reconciliation package and said he was “open” to a two-track process that Thune has advocated for in order to achieve early legislative wins.

Thune has a four-vote margin, including Vice President-elect Sen. J.D. Vance as a tiebreaker. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) will haze zero votes to spare until special elections begin to fill vacancies in April, marking a critical period in Trump’s first 100 days with no room for error.

The House’s success, Thune predicted, “is going to be largely dependent upon [Trump] bringing along Republicans, particularly with regard to things that we do through reconciliation.”

“He’s aware of that dynamic,” Thune said. “There’ll be a need, I would say, for a real strong line of communication between the unified government, between the House, the Senate, White House.”

Trump has already tested Republicans on several occasions, despite not yet moving back into 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. He gave GOP lawmakers whiplash with the short-lived nomination of former Florida GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz in November to be attorney general and again last month by airing eleventh-hour grievances over the size and scope of a stopgap funding bill that nearly caused a government shutdown. The spending snafu forced Johnson to play legislative jiu-jitsu that ultimately paid dividends when Trump last week phoned conservative holdouts to reelect him as speaker.

Thune described his relationship with Johnson as similar to that with Trump, and one that will be equally as important to pass conservative policies. He and Johnson are “very realistic about what it’s going to take to get things done.”

“Trying to figure out how to balance it all and understand what the limitations are in both the House and Senate, and based not only on our rules and our procedures but the political dynamics that we have at work. I think those are things that we are regularly communicating about,” Thune said.

McConnell, the longest-serving Senate party leader, will remain in the chamber as a rank-and-file member for the remainder of his term that runs into January 2027. Although no longer occupying a seat at the leadership table, he’s vowed not to sit on the sidelines and will use what influence he still garners in the GOP to combat growing foreign isolationism in the party.

Thune said he intends to “take full advantage of [McConnell’s] knowledge and experience when necessary.” But he also wants to chart his own path forward as the first person other than McConnell since 2007 to hold the reins of the Senate Republicans.

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McConnell, after all, is no fan favorite of Trump, his base, and a conservative faction of GOP senators.

“[We] obviously welcome his input, thoughts about how we can improve [and] do things better,” Thune said. “Sen. McConnell’s always been a very pragmatic leader, wants to get results, and knows what it takes to get there.”