Tag Archive for: filibuster

Killing the Filibuster Hands All the Power to Liberal Republicans

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Donald Trump ratcheted up the pressure on Senate Republicans on Wednesday in the aftermath of a dismal night for the GOP brand. And while the election defeats were contained to blue states — where most experts would predict an off-year, off night for the president’s party — the hand-wringing over what this could mean for the majority a year from now has the White House reaching for the panic button. “Terminate the filibuster,” Trump demanded — without bothering to consider if the desperate suggestion would even work.

There’s this misconception swirling in the Republican Party that if we could just end the 60-vote threshold, conservatives could enact everything on their wish list. Even the president has fallen for this legislative fairy tale, painting a pie-in-the-sky picture of Congress doing “our own bills.” “We should start tonight, with ‘the country’s’ open, congratulations!’ Then we should pass voter ID, we should pass no mail-in voting, we should pass all the things we want to pass to make our elections fair and safe, because California’s a disaster, many of the states are disasters.’”

It sounds great, as a Republican majority accomplishing America’s agenda always does. There’s just one gaping problem: who actually believes the GOP would stick together long enough to accomplish it? We’ve just come off a tumultuous few years where the House speaker was ousted by his own party, and his replacement, Mike Johnson (R-La.), has had to ride out intra-party storms that rival Hurricane Melissa. The tougher-than-he-looks Louisianan has had to hold his wafer-thin majority together with diplomatic duct tape — through months of floor tantrums, overnighters, back-stabbing, X wars, threats to his gavel, defections, outrageous demands, and betrayal. And that was just for one bill!

Abolishing the filibuster isn’t like waving a magic wand and everything conservatives want suddenly passes. Remember, we had a 51-vote threshold for Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill, and it was anything but an easy lift. It means — as the reconciliation process did — that Republicans have to find a simple (a misnomer in Mike Johnson’s case) majority in both chambers to get something to Donald Trump’s desk. If you’ve paid even scant attention to Washington in the last 10 years, you understand what a herculean task that is for this party. Unlike Democrats, who have supernatural powers to keep their party in line when they need to, the GOP is full of personalities, grandstanders, and people with competing ideas and priorities. Suggesting, after recent history, that they’ll suddenly stick together like good soldiers and vote the way Trump wants is pure folly.

If Johnson can survive the bitter infighting that drags on for weeks and manage to send a bill on, say, election reform to the Senate, it doesn’t get easier. Remember, Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) has his own cross to bear in the form of liberal Republicans like Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Susan Collins (Maine), and other mavericks who like to make a stink on their personal soapboxes. There’s absolutely no guarantee that these rogue senators would get on board with any priority of Thune’s. Worse, they’d have all the bargaining power as leadership desperately tries to sweeten the pot (or weaken the legislation) to get them on board. And if they don’t? Republicans would have destroyed the one tool they’ll have in the minority for nothing.

As Family Research Council’s Quena González warned, “Killing the filibuster would be a disaster. It’s a RINO’s dream.” He’s watched in dismay as liberal Republicans have fought, diluted, or killed bills that include even the mildest pro-life protections like the Hyde Amendment. With a lower threshold, blue-state Republicans and liberal senators would have that much more leverage to hold out for concessions on core values if leadership is desperate to pass something that everyone else in the caucus supports.

And at this point, what has Trump even promised to do with his 51-vote threshold? Has he vowed to pass federal legislation ending late-term abortions? Or crack down on chemical abortion and gender transition procedures? Protect girls’ sports? Expand religious freedom? Reinforce parental rights in education? No. So far, all Americans seem to be getting in this trade for overhauling the entire institution of Congress is “no more mail-in balloting.” And while securing our elections is important, is that enough? What guarantee do voters have that this president, who’s wandered a bit from the social conservatism of his first term, will move from election integrity to the big-ticket items on their to-do list?

“If conservatives, who are never a majority in the Senate, want to retain their ability curb some of the worst excesses of the Democratic Party in the future,” González told The Washington Stand, “even when a few of their liberal fellow Republicans (predictably) want to fold under pressure, they would be wise to follow the lead of those Democrats who, when their party was in the majority two years ago and wanted to obliterate the filibuster, instead looked down-range and thought strategically about the consequences.”

That’s why it’s incredibly disturbing to see senators willing to take this leap, based solely on speculation of what Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) might do if Democrats retake the Senate. The mentality taking hold in the GOP seems to be, “Oh, Democrats will kill the filibuster, so we should kill it first.” But remember, in 2022, when Schumer had control, it was his own members who stopped him. When he and Joe Biden wanted to ram an abortion-on-demand through all nine months of pregnancy at taxpayer expense law through the Senate by setting fire to the filibuster, Senators Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema stopped him. Is there anyone in the Democratic ranks with enough courage to do that now? We don’t know. But John Fetterman (D-Pa.) is looking more sane by the day.

Regardless, making such a profoundly dangerous decision based on the GOP’s best guess of what might happen is a horrible idea for tearing down a 200-year-old rule. And yet, Senators like John Cornyn (R-Texas), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), and Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) seem to be wobbling on a principle that would have been ironclad if they were in the minority.

Americans of all persuasions should be grateful for Leader Thune, who continues to push back against this Trump onslaught by insisting, “There are not the votes there.” It would take, somewhat ironically, 51 senators to set fire to the one wall remaining between the Senate and any hope of cooperation, civility, and bipartisanship. Without it, the upper chamber is just another House — tossed to and fro with the temporary passions and whims of the people and unwilling (and unable) to give the voters who lost any given election a voice.

On “Washington Watch” Wednesday, even a stalwart conservative like Senator Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) seemed tempted by the fool’s gold of bulldozing the last line of defense between America and the tyranny of the majority. “I wish the filibuster was in the Constitution,” the senator admitted to FRC President Tony Perkins, “then it would be next to impossible for the Senate to change it. … I mean, I know people talk about praying for decisions, but I wake up every morning that I would do justice [to these issues]. And truly, I’m torn a little bit trying to decide what the right thing is. If you could guarantee me that the Democrats aren’t going to get rid of the filibuster the next time they’re in control, [then okay],” he said. “… I would prefer to keep the filibuster in place. But if they’re going to change it anyway, should we proceed?” Marshall paused, “If we got rid of the filibuster, then we could make our election secure again. We could basically outlaw mail-in ballots, and we could demand voter ID. So there’s good things. There’s bad things, and I’m truly wrestling with it.”

Then, as if being pulled back from the brink by an imaginary force, the doctor reeled it back in. “I’ve got to, again, admit, a lot of the laws that we pass are bad ones. And what the filibuster does [is] it keeps us from passing even more bad ones. It saves us from ourselves. Other senators have said that the House is like the coffee cup, and the Senate is supposed to be the saucer. We’re supposed to measure twice, cut once. And that’s what the filibuster makes us do. It keeps us from jumping [around on policies] every two years. … So I can think of 100 reasons to defend it.”

As for the Republicans leaning into Trump’s short-sightedness on the issue, Thune was careful. “I don’t doubt that he could have some sway with members,” the leader conceded. “But I know where the math is on this issue in the Senate, and … it’s just not happening.”

In Trump’s defense, he was never in the Senate. He wasn’t even in politics until he ran for president. So maybe he doesn’t understand the long-term implications of what he’s suggesting. For him, nothing matters beyond his term and getting key priorities of the American people over the finish line. That’s an admirable goal — but in a Congress as closely divided as ours, a next-to-impossible one. And not because of the filibuster — but because we haven’t learned to unite around core ideals as a movement, let alone as a people.

Changing the Senate rules won’t unlock the door to every backlogged GOP policy, as some seem to think. Instead, it will build taller and more formidable walls inside parties — and between them. The flames of division will become an inferno that no minority can put out. So, if you like hyper-partisanship, if you dream of a day when there’s not a single thing Republicans can do to stop the runaway train of radical leftist socialism, then by all means, destroy the filibuster.

But if the goal is to move forward as a country, finding ways to work and talk through issues facing our nation together, this isn’t the solution.

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2025 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Senate Rejects Filibuster Change, Defeats Election Overhaul Bills In History-Making Day

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  • The Senate late Thursday rejected a Democratic effort to alter the filibuster in order to pass their long-sought voting bills over unanimous Republican opposition, capping one of the most consequential days in the history of the chamber.
  • The change, had it been adopted, would have established a “talking filibuster,” allowing any senator to speak for or against the bill for as long as they wanted but lowering the 60-vote threshold for passage to a simple majority.
  • Democrats’ attempt to change Senate rules concluded a marathon day of debating in the chamber that saw nearly half of the body speak about the voting bills. They failed, and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer moved to change the rules soon after.
  • Though senators engaged in genuine debate throughout the day, most expressed disdain for how deliberation seemed to have faded from the world’s greatest deliberative body.
  • “I don’t know what happened to the good old days,” said West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, “but I can’t tell you they aren’t here now.” 

The Senate late Thursday rejected a Democratic effort to alter the filibuster in order to pass their long-sought voting bills over unanimous Republican opposition, capping one of the most consequential days in the history of the chamber.

The vote failed 48-52 after Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema voted as they said they would for months, joining a unanimous Republican caucus in opposition and denying their party the necessary support for the change to take effect. The change, had it been adopted, would have established a “talking filibuster” pertaining to the voting bills only, allowing any senator to speak for or against them for as long as they wanted but lowering the 60-vote threshold for passage to a simple majority.

“What we have now … is not a filibuster,” Maine Sen. Angus King, and independent who caucuses with Democrats, said ahead of the vote. “It doesn’t require any effort. It doesn’t require any speeches. It doesn’t require to hold the floor.”

“Strom Thurmond would have loved this filibuster,” King added, invoking the late segregationist senator who set the record for the longest filibuster speech ever while speaking against the 1957 Civil Rights Act.

Democrats’ attempt to change Senate rules concluded a marathon day of debating in the chamber that saw nearly half of the body speak either for the John Lewis Voting Rights Reauthorization Act and the Freedom to Vote Act, the twin bills that passed the House Thursday with a quirk that prevented Senate Republicans from blocking debate on them as they had in the past.

The voting bills failed to garner 60 Senate votes earlier Wednesday night even though Manchin and Sinema voted in favor, sparking Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s motion to change Senate rules to allow them to pass without GOP support.

“For those who believe bipartisanship is possible, we have proven them wrong,” Manchin said ahead of the vote. “Ending the filibuster would be the easy way out. I cannot support such a perilous course for this nation when elected leaders are sent to Washington to unite our country by putting politics and party aside.”

Democrats have said the bills are necessary to counter election reform laws that Republican state legislatures across the country have passed in the wake of the 2020 election that allegedly suppress people’s ability to vote. As a result, nearly all have endorsed altering the filibuster to ensure their passage even if done on a partisan basis.

“I share with many of you … a vision of the Senate that collaborates and negotiates the most important issue of our time,” Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock said. “I believe in bipartisanship. But at what cost? Who is being asked to foot the bill for this bipartisanship and is liberty itself the cost?”

Republicans, however, have countered that the federal legislation, which sets uniform voting standards and outlaws partisan gerrymandering, will invite voter fraud and infringe on states’ rights to oversee their own elections.

“The president and his party will try to use fear and panic to smash the Senate, silence millions of Americans and size control of our democracy,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Wednesday.

McConnell said hours later that while the day was one of the most consequential in the history of the Senate, it really boiled down to a simple question: “Will it take 60 votes to pass massive changes or a simple majority to ram them through? That’s what’s at stake here.”

Though senators engaged in genuine debate throughout the day, most expressed disdain for how deliberation seemed to have faded from the world’s greatest deliberative body. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the only Republican who backed the John Lewis voting bill, said Wednesday that the rhetoric surrounding voting has become very concerning.

“I was part of a very troubling conversation last evening,” she said. “It was shared depending on which side you’re on in this body today on this issue, you’re either a racist or a hypocrite. Really, is that where we are?”

Manchin echoed her hours later in his speech, criticizing the lack of bipartisanship as he has time and time again throughout his filibuster defenses.

“I don’t know what happened to the good old days,” he said, “but I can’t tell you they aren’t here now.”

COLUMN BY

ANDREW TRUNSKY

Political reporter. Follow Andrew on Twitter @atrunsky

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McConnell Blasts ‘The Left’s Big Lie’ As Schumer Prepares Another Voting Bill Push

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Will Republicans Protest and Litigate to Stop Iran Nuclear Pact?

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stop iran rally september 9thWhere there were five undeclared Democrat Senators on the cusp of reconvening Congress, today there is only one, Ms. Cantwell from Washington State. Three Democrat Senators: Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Gary Price of Michigan declared for the President’s position. Two of the three Democrat Senators who declared for the President position, Blumenthal and Wyden are up for re-election in 2016, while Price is not. The lone Democrat who joined with the Republican majority to oppose the Iran Pact is West Virginia Senator, Joe Manchin.

In a statement released by his office, Manchin said, “I believe that to be a super power, you must possess super diplomatic skills, and I believe that we can use these skills to negotiate a better deal.”

That leaves possibly 58 Senators, 54 Republicans and four Democrats opposing the Iran nuclear pact. That is two shy of the required 60 votes for cloture under the current Senate Rule 22 to cut off a filibuster. A vote on the majority resolutions rejecting the Iran pact could be scheduled as early as Thursday. That is, if the promised filibuster led by Senator Minority Democrat Leader Reid doesn’t stop the vote first.

Reid unleashed the filibuster option on Saturday, September 5th. White House Spokesperson Josh Earnest said Tuesday, September 8th:

It would be a little ironic for now Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to express concerns about a tactic that he, himself, employed on countless occasions. The other thing that I’ll point out is that the 60 vote threshold is actually one that was approved by the 98 senators who voted for the Corker-Cardin legislation back in the spring.

Opponents of the Iran nuclear pact circulated a letter on Capitol Hill today signed by 15 governors including  four  Republican hopefuls; Jindal of Louisiana, Christie of New Jersey, Kasich of Ohio and Walker of Wisconsin.  Republican majority and other opponents of the filibuster floor maneuver by minority Democrats criticize it for denying an up or down vote on the measure that Americans in leading polls taken by a 2 to 1 margin have urged Congress to reject the Iran deal.  Harvard law professor emeritus, Alan Dershowitz, author of The Case Against the Iran Deal said in a Steve Malzberg Show interview on NewsMax TV, September 3, 2015:

As an opponent of the deal, a filibuster would be a good result because it would deny legitimacy to the deal. The American public is not going to accept a deal that was filibustered. Let’s remember what a filibuster is. It was a southern strategy designed to undo democracy and to offend equality.

Dershowitz drew attention to the quandary that Israel and PM Netanyahu would face if the Iran pact was approved:

I know Benjamin Netanyahu. I’ve known him since 1973. He is not going to sit back and allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons.

This deal makes it much harder for Israel to defend its people.

In a Washington Post opinion article by Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-KS), member of the House Permanent Intelligence Committee, and Constitutional lawyer, David B. Rivkin, Jr.  Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies argued that the failure to deliver a side deal might void the Iran pact. Further they raised the prospect of   possible litigation against the President on the grounds that the he didn’t deliver the requisite information. They were especially concerned about the IAEA side agreements with Iran to prepare a Road Map on prior military developments. Aversion of which was leaked with provisions for self inspection at the military site of Parchin, Iran.  That Road Map is a condition for release of $100 billion in sequestered funds held by US and foreign financial institutions.    Switzerland has already released their sanctions and Russia and China are poised to release their holdings. The EU3 component of the P5+1 are already in discussions with Tehran over billions of trade deals preventing a possible snap back of sanctions should Iran be found cheating on a sneak out to a nuclear weapon.  A weapon that some believe it may already have and be able to possibly via a satellite launch.

The Pompeo- Rivkin Washington Post opinion was earlier supported by Jerome Marcus, Esq. in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece, “An Informed Vote on the Iran Deal.”  Marcus suggested  based on his experience as a young lawyer assisting former State Department counsel, Abraham Sofaer in the Reagan era,   executive agreements like JCPOA with far reaching implications should be treated as if it was a treaty.  Marcus concluded:

The lesson for today is clear: When a legislative body is deciding whether to approve an international agreement, especially one as important as the recent nuclear agreement with Iran, its members have the right to access the agreement’s negotiating record. Members of Congress should demand that record now, and they should examine it, before they cast their votes.

To bring such a suit Dr. Robert B. Sklaroff and Lee S. Bender, Esq. suggested in a FrontpageMagazine article that the Senate Majority Leader, McConnell should undertake the following steps:

Emergency Prescription for Senate:  [1]—Pass rule that abolishes the filibuster; [2]—Pass resolution declaring the Iran nuke deal to be a “treaty”; [3]—Defeat the deal; and [4]—Sue President Obama to enjoin him from implementing the deal.

The procedures for initiating the first critical step, achieving cloture cutting off the threatened filibuster, are contained in two relevant Congressional Research Service reports; Considerations for Changes in Senate Rules by Richard S. Beth, January 2013 and Filibusters and Cloture by Beth and Valerie Heitschusen, December 2014.

Sklaroff heard Dershowitz at a presentation in Cherry Hill, New Jersey on September 2nd.  He reported on Dershowitz’s remarks and response:

On September 2, Dershowitz, at the Jewish Community Center in Cherry Hill, N.J., amplified on this viewpoint, quoting Federalist 64:  “The power of making treaties is an important one, especially as it relates to war, peace, and commerce; and it should not be delegated but in such a mode, and with such precautions, as will afford the highest security that it will be exercised by men the best qualified for the purpose, and in the manner most conducive to the public good.”

When I [discussed] with him the necessity to sue Obama, he initially raised concern that this would be discarded as a “political question.” “Who would sue?” he asked rhetorically. “Senator McConnell!” said I. “Well, it’s a possibility, because he would have standing, representing the Senate.”

Has such a suit been brought by the Senate against President Obama and the Supreme Court ruled on the matter of executive overreach of lawful authorities?   There is the example of the Supreme Court   June 2014 unanimous ruling against the President for his three day recess appointment of National Labor Relations Board and Consumer Protection officials in 2012 that required approval by  the Senate.  The original matter was brought by a Washington State bottler and a decision rendered in the DC US Circuit Court of Appeals by Judge David B. Sentelle. Note the comments of the Republican Counsel for the Senate and then Senate Majority Leader Reid from a Washington Post article:

Miguel Estrada, who represented Senate Republicans in the case, called the ruling a victory for the Senate. “The Supreme Court reaffirmed the Senate’s power to prescribe its own rules, including the right to determine for itself when it is in session, and rejected the President’s completely unprecedented assertion of unilateral appointment power,” he said.

But Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) blamed Senate Republicans for denying nominees a chance to be confirmed through a vote of the full chamber. “President Obama did the right thing when he made these appointments on behalf of American workers.”

Tomorrow, September 9, 2015, Democrat Presidential front runner Hillary Clinton former Secretary of State, embroiled in a private email server controversy, will make the case for support of the President’s position.  She has previously gone on record saying:

The Europeans, the Russians, the Chinese, they’re gonna say we agreed with the Americans, I guess their president can’t make foreign policy. That’s a very bad signal to send.

Clinton will be a minor distraction from the Tea Party Patriots (TPP) Stop Iran Now Rally chaired by Jenny Beth Martin on the West Lawn of the US Capitol Building with a cast of media luminaries in the opposition camp.  The event is co-sponsored by TPP, Zionist Organization of America and the Center for Security Policy. The roster of those speaking includes TPP head Martin, Republican Presidential front runner Donald Trump, fellow Presidential hopeful Ted Cruz (R-TX), Conservative talk show Hosts Glen Beck and Mark Levin, David Bossie of Citizens United, Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ), Chairman of the Congressional Israel Allies Caucus, former CIA-director, Ambassador R. James Woolsey, Chairman of the FDD, Frank Gaffney of the CSP, Sarah Stern of EMET and Mort Klein of the ZoA. This will be a media spectacle.

Late this afternoon, my colleague at 1330amWEBY Mike Bates, host of “Your Turn”, and I reviewed these developments.  Listen to the WEBY audio segment here.  Bates observed that the motivation behind these political maneuverings was President Obama’s objective all along to bolster Iran’s position in the Middle East as a recognized nuclear threshold state threatening traditional support for Allies in the region, Israel, Saudi Arabia, the Emirates and Egypt. Bates thought the Reid filibuster play was simply a travesty of politics as usual in Washington.   In turn we both discussed the strange case of Florida US. Representative and Democratic National Committee head, Debbie Wasserman-Shultz, who has infuriated segments of her large but divided Jewish constituency.  In her public statement she said tearfully that from her “Jewish heart” the Iran pact, as defective as it is, was the correct thing to do.  We concurred that the filibuster if not upended by a Republican cloture to force an up or down vote would enable her and other Democrat colleagues up for re-election in 2016 to claim that there was never a vote. Political cover that comes at a high price of Iran receiving tens of billions now with promises of trillions in economic trade benefits. All while harboring secret development of nuclear weapons threatening the U.S. and Israel.

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EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.