During last week’s episode of the Truth and Liberty livecast, titled “Breaking the Gridlock,” host Richard Harris, a prominent Republican activist, called for the end of the Senate filibuster.
“It’s a real problem. The more divided America has become, the more important — and really in a bad way — the more powerful the filibuster rule or the cloture rule has become,” said Harris. “Should we invoke the nuclear option, which means change or eliminate the filibuster, the cloture rule? It’s because they’re so scared of what it might do if we didn’t have this artificial rule in there.”
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump called for an end to the filibuster. U.S. Rep. Jeff Crank (R-CO), Harris’ guest, blamed the filibuster in part for the most recent government shutdown, the longest so far in U.S. history. “It’s very simple,” he explained. “The Republicans — 99% of the Republicans in the House of Representatives — voted to keep the government open. That clean [continuing resolution] went over to the Senate, and 99% of the Republicans in the Senate voted to keep the government open. But 14 times now, the U.S. Senate has not passed that bill, and what’s happening is they’re filibustering it. It needs to get 60 votes. We have as many as 55 votes that have voted for it over the last month, in a little over five weeks. We can’t get to that 60 because we need five Democrats to come to their senses and pass this and pay our soldiers, pay our men and women who are fighting to keep us safe in the skies, our air traffic controllers, our TSA agents, and so many others.”
Earlier in the shutdown, Crank derided the filibuster as a “silly game” that the Democrats were “shamefully” playing.
Criticism of the filibuster isn’t unique to Republicans. During the Biden administration, some in the Democratic Party also called for the end of the filibuster to pass legislative protections for abortion and LGBTQ people. In 2022, A number of prominent members of the U.S. House of Representatives, including DSA-supported Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), expressed support for ending the filibuster. Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO) tweeted, “If it’s abortion care or the filibuster, the filibuster must go.”
“A lot of this comes down to the filibuster, and now you know why I’m a proponent of abolishing the filibuster,” said Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO) in 2022, when asked about legislative solutions for abortion rights and LGBTQ Americans. “There are so many extremely important issues, that are overwhelmingly supported by the American people, that have gone to the Senate to die, for exactly that reason. I think the times are changing.”
Despite their efforts, moderate Democrats like Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-CO) and Michael Bennet (D-CO) opposed ending the filibuster. During his 2022 reelection campaign, Bennet discussed his plans for reforming the filibuster.
“I have long said that I think we should change the rules in the U.S. Senate,” Bennet said during an event in Colorado Springs. “I’ve long said that, and I think what my changes would be, if I were able to do it, which I think would work well for both parties, is to have prolonged and extended debate. We don’t have any debate anymore. The whole system was designed to have extended debate, to have the minority have the chance to offer amendments in a meaningful way, which they don’t today, and in the end have 51 Senators be able to make a decision, not just on choice but on anything.”
In December 2021, Bennet laid out his plan for Senate filibuster reform in an op-ed for The Colorado Sun. Bennet’s plan included “[flipping] the burden of delay by making the minority party produce 41 votes to continue debate, instead of requiring the majority to produce 60 votes to end it; [Guaranteeing] a real voice for the minority party by ensuring votes on a minimum number of amendments for both sides whenever legislation is brought to the floor; [Requiring] those who continue debate to actually hold the floor and talk, like ‘Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,’ instead of phoning it in from their office as they do today, and once both parties have made their case on the floor and had votes on their amendments, the Senate must be able to pass legislation with 51 votes.”
