Is the filibuster a drag on democracy?
To scrap or not to scrap? Lawmakers are again wrestling with that recurrent, abiding question about the filibuster, the wonky Senate procedure that some say is a key agent of obstruction in Congress.
President Donald Trump has placed himself squarely in Camp Scrap, urging Senate Republicans to get rid of the filibuster so that the GOP can muscle through legislation on controversial issues like immigration without needing bipartisan support.
Former Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid made a similar case earlier this month in a New York Times op-ed, in which he urged his party to eliminate the procedure once they regain power. Otherwise the Senate will never act on issues such as climate change and guns, he said.
A few days later, current Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., issued a rebuttal, defending the filibuster and accusing Democrats of wanting to run roughshod over Senate tradition in order to “inflict” a “laundry list of socialist policies” on Middle America.
The 2020 Democratic presidential contenders are
What’s a filibuster for?The “nuclear option”Why boot the filibuster? Tradition!