US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he will refuse to sign a landmark housing bill unless congressional Republicans ram through the voting overhaul he has sought, exacerbating a clash with his party ahead of midterm elections. Trump for months has been demanding passage of the SAVE America Act, a package that would impose strict new limits on elections, including requiring all voters to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote, and photo identification to cast a ballot. Read moreBlonde, fervent and fake: Can AI-generated Trump fans boost him in the midterms? In his zeal to get the reforms – criticised by Democrats as an assault on voting rights – across the finish line, he squashed what Republicans were hoping would be positive political optics: a high-profile ceremony featuring Trump and addressing the all-important issue of affordability. "Today's Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency," Trump posted on his Truth Social platform, just two hours before the event at the US Capitol. The election reform measure has already failed in the Senate, and critics say it is a blatant effort to suppress voting in Democratic-leaning communities. Read moreDeaths in ICE detention more than double under Trump, analysis finds But Trump, who still regularly airs his false claims that he won the 2020 election, has repeatedly demanded passage of the bill, even as Republican leaders explain there is little chance of it passing in the chamber due to Senate rules and a lack of support among some Republican senators. While he scrapped Wednesday's signing ceremony, the president nevertheless trudged up to Capitol Hill to huddle with Senate Republicans at lunchtime. As he walked with Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Trump largely ignored reporters' questions about whether he would sign the housing bill. Instead he volunteered without prompting that the Middle East "war is going very well" and that "Iran is making very big concessions."