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Senate Democrats’ Latest Crazy Filibuster Idea
While you’ve been busy watching football or digging out of snowstorms, both House and Senate Democrats have been working overtime to find a way of enacting a partisan federal takeover of America’s elections. They are desperate to get a bill to the president’s desk.
And they are almost there. But that last hurdle is a doozy.
Please stick with me here because this is a sordid tale of brazen politics and a power grab that is unfolding before us that may blow up the Senate.
Let’s start with the House.
If the Dems follow through on this maneuver, it will be great theater. I like the visual of a series of lone Republicans, reading from the proposed law, discussing the constitutional merits, citing the various poll data and bravely holding back the majority from a massive power grab from the states. I’d love to hear them discuss recent State legislation as contrasted with Blue state election law. Heck, we may even hear about the potential for irregularity as evidenced in 2020. It will be a fun time. Buy some popcorn and settle in. The Mr. Smiths are back in town and ready to talk!
They can’t, because they’ve spent the last year ginning up the base to believe that the Republicans are trying to “overthrow Democracy”. It’s all they have left.
I love your mastery of the arcane rules of the Senate. I agree that the Democrats are trying to pull a fast one.
I have no huge problem with a talking filibuster, if a majority of the Senate (50+1) voted to change the rules to permit it. I am not a happy camper at the notion of Schumer springing a talking filibuster on the Senate without 51 votes.
I do not care for either of the Democrat bills. These were bills for the purpose of making a point, not enacting a new law. I do not support federalizing elections.
I hope that we can fix the Electoral Count Act.
Once again, an incredible post.
Cheaters cheat, liars lie, democrats are low-life, manipulating scum.
I am grateful for your kind and thoughtful comments.
I don’t know … Their legislative Jiu Jitsu is pretty powerful. Wasn’t it some similar arcana that brought ObamaCare into the world? Where was McConnell’s Kung Fu then? And despite years of promising to undo it … it’s still here. I have a bad feeling about this.
This is an existential crisis for Republicans. But I truly believe McConnell is happier in the minority. He never has to deliver anything but can “fundraise” non-stop off Dem craziness. I’m not sure McConnell fully appreciates the urgency.
I don’t think he will. There was an interesting article that came out a while back claiming that none of this is actually intended to succeed, the voting “reform”, the elimination of the filibuster etc.
Schumer is a savvy enough politician to know all of this absurdity is a non-starter with the public at large. He at least can count and realizes that Sinema and Manchin are not on board with any of the crazier ideas being proposed so it is all dead on arrival anyway. The point of this is to appease the base with grand gestures. It’s clear the base of the party has wildly unrealistic ideas about what can be achieved with such narrow control of Congress, so if he can’t give them what they demand he can at least give them a grand show.
So if that is the goal then why is it the goal? Schumer can also read polls and knows that the Democrats are heading for a shellacking in the midterms.
The House is clearly done for, Pelosi is gone as speaker after the midterms.
But that doesn’t mean Schumer can’t save something in the Senate if he can make certain the base is not utterly demoralized and shows up for the midterms, thereby keeping a shellacking from becoming a bloodbath.
In the Arizona Legislature, a bill has to be “read” three times on the floor before it becomes law. There is also the “single issue” rule that bills need to have only a single issue, or they violate the State Constitution. (An authorized large prison violated this rule, and the half-built prison was found to be unconstitutional by the appellate courts. The solution was a whole bunch of remediation measures to get the votes to complete the prison.)
There is a deadline for bills to clear committees, so it is not at all uncommon towards the end of the session for more powerful legislator to tell a new member, “excuse me but I need your bill [as a vehicle],” and then to wipe out all of the prior language with a “strike all” amendment and a new text being substituted. The only thing the old bill and new bill have in common is that they have the same bill number, But remember, that new bill is ready to be voted on as that bill number has already been “read” twice and is ready for its third and final reading.
There is also something called the “COW” which stands for the “Committee of the Whole” meaning that the bill is in a “committee” of all of the 30 State Senators, or 60 State Representatives, so that a bill can be changed on the floor. The details of this are a bit beyond me.
Neither God nor Man is safe when the Arizona Legislature is in session.”
Why would the polls matter if they can fix the elections? And how will the public find out – from corporate media? Any objections will be censored on social media and “fact” “checked” to death. And then the FBI steps in…
Even if we treat it all as a game – as they do on the Hill – the upside for the Dems is bigger than the downside for the GOPe.
It’s a lock.
If.
They used the Covid plague to institute Calvinball rules on the election so they could get rid of Trump, and then they immediately tried to write all those “emergency” changes into law.
Thanks for an excellent post, good morning coffee read.
Great post, Kelly. Once again, I appreciate your realpolitik perspective.
I agree and disagree. I think that all of the emergency rules were adopted due to a once a century pandemic, which had the effect of hurting Trump. As of November 2020, the vaccines were not out and I did not eat outside of the office until after I had been double vaccinated. The notion of standing in line at the polls looked very, very scary.
However, I will grant you that the Democrats want to write all of those one-time emergency changes into law. I wholly agree with you that that would be a power grab of the highest order.
I also love hearing the ins and outs of skullduggery at the capitol. Kelly’s posts are an absolute delight.
Schumer is fighting hard to gain something at this time, because it looks like he will be in a primary contest with what’s-her-name (AOC? OAC? whatever).
Gary:
“I wholly agree with you that that would be a power grab of the highest order.”
Gary, is this really you? I am glad you came to your senses.
Don’t rest on your laurels about this just yet. These are the quarterly averages. I thought I heard some talking head say that the December monthly numbers showed it was back to a dead heat.
Remember, he wanted them to take control of Congress.
I find it interesting that the Democrats are so clearly signaling that the “voting rights bill” is an evil that would be very bad for voters and for the republic. We don’t need to actually read the bill to know it is really bad. Otherwise the President would not have needed to lie so prolifically last week in promoting it (not just shading the truth, but outright lies). Proponents cannot point to any need for the bill (none have cited any real instances of citizens being unreasonably restricted in their ability to vote). If the bill were reasonable, politicians would not be exerting such extraordinary efforts to pass it while disclosing so little of its actual content. Procedural sleight of hand would not be needed. Even though I have virtually no insight into the actual content of the bill, the actions of the Democrats tell me it is something really, really bad.
You are being too kind . . .