Here’s a number to remember: 41.5 million. I’ll circle back to it soon.
We’re mired in an unprecedented crisis, and the American majority wants and deserves decisive action. Given that reality, I (and perhaps you as well) have no patience whatsoever for another round of Republican obstruction – the kind that plagued Barack Obama when he was tasked with digging us out of the Great Recession. The stakes are even higher than they were in 2009, because hundreds of thousands of lives are being lost.
So enough with trying to play nice, as Democrats are wont to do. Since they narrowly run the Senate now, they should move heaven and earth to smash the filibuster once and for all – in other words, to clear the way for legislation to pass with a simple majority (mirroring the will of the American majority), instead of the artificial 60-vote threshold required to “break” a filibuster, a threshold found nowhere in the Constitution. Then it’s goodbye filibuster, which is found nowhere in the Constitution.
It’s bad enough that the Senate (and the GOP in general) remains infested with traitors who tried to overthrow the will of the people in a free and fair democratic election – none of whom have been punished in any way. Heck, some of them still get air time to keep their lies alive. But now, in the Senate, these enemies of democracy are also poised to block new and crucially needed efforts to help millions of suffering Americans who have lost their jobs or health to the pandemic. This is no time to indulge the Republicans, as they ready the filibuster weapon, yet again, to wield power over the majority.
Granted, the Senate is split at 50-50. But remember that number I floated in the first paragraph? Here’s where it becomes relevant:
Because each state gets two senators, regardless of whether the state is packed with people or strewn with prairie, there is a ridiculous imbalance of representation. In 2021, Senate Democrats represent 41.5 million more Americans than Senate Republicans. A filibuster (which is wielded simply by threatening to talk a bill to death, not to actually do it) can’t be broken until there are 60 votes. Which basically means that the minority GOP (which disproportionately represents white rural states) has veto power over the will of the majority.
That veto power has long been scandalous – for generations it was wielded by white racist senators to thwart civil rights legislation – but never more so in recent years than in 2013, after the Sandy Hook elementary school massacre. There was landslide public support for a modest bipartisan gun control bill that required background checks on most private firearm sales, and 54 senators voted for that reform. But thanks to a Republican filibuster, it “failed” because it didn’t get 60 votes.
Today, there’s landslide public support for massive infusions of new Covid relief, but if filibustering Republicans are allowed to usher in another era of minority rule, the American majority that voted for decisive action won’t get sufficient relief. It’s not hyperbole to say that the current crisis is a matter of life or death – not just for innocent Americans, but for the democratic process.
If the filibuster stays, the entire Democratic wish list – including immigration reform, job creation, climate change reform, voting rights, racial-equity reform – would be at risk. If the filibuster stays, Republicans can thwart those efforts and campaign in the ’22 midterms with the message that Democrats don’t get things done.
The Democratic majority (all 50 senators, plus veep Kamala Harris as the tie-breaker) has the right to change the chamber’s rules. It can vote to erase the filibuster. But President Biden, a former Senate traditionalist, is reportedly loath to support such a move – unless, perhaps, a crucial and popular piece of legislation is threatened with filibuster death.
That day will likely come; in the throes of a pandemic, we can ill afford that status quo. Too many lives and livelihoods are at stake. Republicans, as evidenced by the insurrectionists in their ranks, don’t care about the will of the people; the only alternative is to break their minority power. As Thomas Jefferson reminded us 220 years ago, “The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government.”