President Donald Trump has demanded that Senate Republicans pass the SAVE America Act, his flagship voter suppression law that would put massive new restrictions on the ballot box, at all costs — and a number of MAGA supporters have come up with a theory that the GOP can defeat a Democratic filibuster by simply requiring them to hold the floor and talk the whole time.
But demanding a “Senate sleepover” is a fantasy that won’t do anything, the Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote on Tuesday.
“How is the GOP supposed to get all this past the Senate’s filibuster, which requires 60 votes to end debate?” wrote the board. “There’s no good answer without changing the rules in some way to nuke the filibuster, which would be a grave mistake for Republicans. The 60-vote rule always frustrates the party in power, but it’s what stops a bare majority of Democrats from restructuring the Supreme Court and creating new states out of Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico.”
As for the idea of a “talking filibuster,” the board wrote, the current rules don’t actually allow it — or at least, they don’t allow it without massive caveats that would just tank the whole endeavor.
“Given the chamber’s rules, this vision is a mirage,” wrote the board. “The reality is that Democratic Senators could take turns giving interminable speeches. Cory Booker last year went 25 hours all by himself. Meantime, Republicans would have to keep most of their Senators handy at all times, ready to answer a quorum call, meaning it would turn into an endless GOP campout. Bring your pajamas, toothbrush, and CPAP machine.”
Making matters worse, the board wrote, “Democrats could offer amendments that either undermine the bill’s intent or put swing-state Republicans on the spot. Raise the minimum wage? Extend ObamaCare subsidies? What else? The talking filibuster idea ‘is much more complicated and risky than people are assuming,’ Majority Leader John Thune told reporters this week. He said Tuesday that Republicans lack the votes to get to a talking filibuster or sustain one if they did.”
The bottom line, wrote the board, is that the “talking filibuster” just isn’t an option. “If it were, Democrats would have done it already — and they’d certainly copy the maneuver next time to pass far more transformational bills than the SAVE America Act.”
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