EXCLUSIVE: Anna Paulina Luna says John Thune shouldn’t be at the GOP’s midterm convention

“I don’t think he should be here,” Luna told the Washington Examiner during a brief interview. “He’s the reason why we don’t have SAVE America.”Luna has not been shy in her disapproval of Thune’s Senate leadership. She previously vowed to hold up the House floor until Thune passed the SAVE America Act, which would require voter ID to cast a ballot and proof of citizenship to register to vote nationwide. Thune has repeatedly said he does not have the votes to move the legislation in the Senate given the 60-vote filibuster threshold. The majority leader has also said there is insufficient support to scrapping the filibuster along party lines in the 53-47 GOP-controlled Senate.Unlike Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), Thune is attending the GOP convention but is not speaking. A source familiar with Thune’s thinking said the majority leader declined to speak at the convention out of a desire to candidates and other Republicans to address a national audience.While Thune does not have a speaking slot, the source confirmed the majority leader is in Dallas and has a “full schedule” this week.Still, Luna told the Washington Examiner that even if Thune had taken the stage, she believes he would have gotten a poor reception.“I don’t think he’d be welcome,” she said.Luna described passing voter ID as a “90-10 issue” and that Thune has “hid behind the filibuster.”“The filibuster is a perversion of what it was supposed to represent,” Luna said. “The Democrats, by the way, are saying they want to abolish the filibuster anyway. What gives, bro?”Thune ruled out abolishing the filibuster during an interview last week with KELOLAND News, saying that “we don’t have close to the votes to do that.”The majority leader told the outlet that the only way Congress will be able to make “some headway” on passing components of the SAVE America Act is through a budget reconciliation bill.LIVE UPDATES: REPUBLICANS GATHER IN DALLAS FOR FIRST-EVER GOP MIDTERM CONVENTIONWhen asked if he gets frustrated with calls to get rid of the filibuster and pass the SAVE America Act, Thune conceded it is frustrating in the “sense that I feel like sometimes I’m the only person in D.C. that seems to know how to count to 50.”“It’d be a better use of everybody’s time, again, I said before, to go out and make this an issue on the campaign trail and try and elect more Republicans to pass the SAVE Act rather than continue to argue a — what is going to be a — it’s just a losing argument to suggest we’re going to get rid of the filibuster,” Thune said.