Vice President Kamala Harris – one of just two people who have a shot at running the country for the next four years – wants to drive the final nail into the coffin of the filibuster. The VP said on Tuesday that she wants to see an exception passed to the filibuster rule allowing even a slim Democratic majority in the Senate to protect abortion in federal law – a special occasion carve out for an important issue, if you will. But in the real world, it doesn’t work like that. Abortion isn’t the only issue Harris has said she’d scrap the filibuster for, and it wouldn’t take long for the next “important” cause to crop up.
And what does she think will happen once the wheel turns yet again and Republicans are in charge?
Open Mouth, Insert Foot
“I think we should eliminate the filibuster for Roe,” Harris told Wisconsin Public Radio on Tuesday. Immediately afterward, Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat-turned-independent from West Virginia, announced he would not support Harris for president.
The filibuster is a rule that requires 60 votes to end the debate phase on a bill to advance it to a final vote. This isn’t the first time Harris – and, indeed, the majority of Democrats in the Senate – hoped to skirt the filibuster. And it wasn’t the first time it backfired, either.
Back in 2013, then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada, employed what has been called the nuclear option: a simple majority vote to change the rules of the Senate and eliminate the filibuster for confirmations of presidential nominees other than Supreme Court justices. In 2017, Republicans won the Senate majority and Mitch McConnell (R-KY) became the majority leader. He then led a successful vote to end the filibuster for Supreme Court nominations to get President Donald Trump’s first pick, Neil Gorsuch, confirmed. That same simple majority of Republicans went on to confirm two more of Trump’s Supreme Court picks.
Did Harry Reid see that coming? He should have.
Harris has previously stated that she’d end the filibuster for the Green New Deal and for a national abortion protection act. In fact, in 2022, every Democrat in the Senate save two – Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who also left the party – voted to end the filibuster to pass a law that would protect abortion access nationwide.
Can the Filibuster Survive Another Democrat Trifecta?
We’ve long known of Joe Biden’s war on the filibuster – and now we know Harris will follow in his footsteps should she win the presidency. Unlike Biden, however, Harris actually has a chance of winning the war. Should Democrats also maintain – or even grow – their majority in the Senate, it will be made up entirely of lawmakers already proven willing to nuke the filibuster and of any fresh faces who managed to win the party’s endorsement and then the election. The only two Democrats to have voted recently in favor of the filibuster aren’t running for re-election.
Democrats likely won’t make this move unless they win the White House, the House of Representatives, and the Senate because they need both houses of Congress and the president to push through partisan laws. But should they accomplish such a feat – something that isn’t all that uncommon – one can only assume the filibuster will end.
If they don’t eliminate it entirely, Democrats will “make exceptions” by way of nuclear option votes for every little cause they deem worthy – a death by 1,000 cuts. Even if the filibuster remains in name (save for however many holes Democrats poke in it for their pet causes, of course), it won’t last long. Why would GOP lawmakers, who would have watched powerlessly as Democrats treated the filibuster like they do the Second Amendment – saying they support it while trying incrementally to gut it – not do the same? The very next Republican trifecta government would likely mean the end of the filibuster even in name – after all, if Democrats can pass whatever law they like, why shouldn’t Republicans do the same when it’s their turn?
Senator McConnell told Politico on Thursday that Harris’ filibuster rule change would “turn America into California.” He called it a “major structural change to the country.” He probably isn’t wrong. Liberty Nation News issued the same warning about a month ago. Should Democrats win the trifecta sans someone like Manchin or Sinema, the legislative filibuster is doomed – and abortion isn’t the only thing on the Democrat docket. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said in August that he hopes to end the 60-vote rule for legislation so he can pass two voting rights bills. He went on to explain that he’d also likely use the changed procedure to “codify abortion rights” and pass major economic legislation.
Then there’s packing the Supreme Court with progressive justices to counter the current conservative majority – another idea floated by the Biden administration. And how about statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington, DC – or, for that matter, any US territory that’s likely to lean Democrat? Then the House and Senate can be loaded down with left-wing lawmakers, essentially rendering the election process a mere show (especially with relaxed voting laws). If Democrats win the trifecta in November and manage to kill the filibuster, it’s entirely possible for them to become unbeatable by the time the next election rolls around. In short: The next Democrat trifecta could mean an end to GOP trifectas from then on.
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