West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin spent Friday and Saturday acting as an obstinant roadblock for his exasperated and exhausting Democratic colleagues, who were just trying to pass the version of the American Rescue Plan that they’d all seemed to have agreed on. It took nearly 24 hours and some rather annoying concessions to Manchin’s ego, but he finally gave the legislation the green light. He earned himself praise from Majority Leader Chuck Schumer but some eye rolls from colleagues and plenty of blowback from frustrated Democratic voters.
Maybe he got the message?
This morning, during an interview with Chuck Todd on Meet the Press, one of the four Sunday talk shows for which he was booked, Manchin signaled a new openness to making some accommodations and changes on the filibuster that he has thus far steadfastly defended.
“And now if you want to make it a little more painful, make him stand there and talk, I’m willing to look at any way we can. But I’m not willing to take away the involvement of the minority. I’ve been in the minority. I’ve been in the majority. And I can tell you the respect I have on both sides when I’ve been there should be ‘I’ve got something to say, listen to me,’ and I want that to happen.”
The headline of NBC News’s story is “Manchin says he still supports the filibuster,” but make no mistake: This is a HUGE shift. Shifting a 60-vote threshold to a talking filibuster is essentially ending the filibuster in all but name only. It means debate will have to end. And as we know, Republicans have no real interest in putting in any effort — Ron Johnson forced Senate clerks to read the American Rescue Plan on Thursday night and didn’t even stay for most of it, while Ted Cruz, as you’ll recall, literally ran away to Mexico to avoid helping his constituents in Texas when the state’s energy grid was disabled amid a massive and unexpected winter storm.
It wasn’t a slip-up, either: Manchin said something similar on Fox News Sunday.
Now we’re seeing some real momentum. Both senators from Minnesota, Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith, signaled that they were ready to end the filibuster, as did Montana Sen. Jon Tester. If Manchin is willing to budge on this, Kyrsten Sinema — who got just pilloried for the way she voted “no” on the minimum wage on Friday — must not be far behind.
Maybe Manchin realizes that the idea that the filibuster fosters more bipartisanship — as Sinema had said earlier last week — is totally off. On Saturday, he voted for Rob Portman’s amendment on unemployment insurance, just to see Portman vote against the whole package. Lisa Murkowski slipped help for Alaska drillers into the deal and then voted against it, too. They only want to weaken things, not offer any actual support.
Republicans are back in their blow-it-all-up stance. They are doing exactly what they did under Obama: Nothing. They refuse to compromise or participate. They only want to stop any and all legislation in its tracks. That means no minimum wage increase at all, no climate change plan, and certainly no voting rights reform.
Joe Biden is said to believe that a bit of Republican support for some of his nominees suggests that bipartisanship is possible, but the reality is that because they only need 50 votes to pass, Republicans won’t have an impact on them either way so long as Democrats stick together. Their willingness to vote for those nominees stems from the lack of filibuster. If they know legislation is going to pass, they might actually try to get involved. Plus, it’s not as if they’re being all that helpful — they’re delaying Merrick Garland’s confirmation until next week.
Simply put, if Democrats don’t kill the filibuster, it’ll kill their chances to be a national political party. Gerrymandering and voter suppression will kill them in swing states and come 2030, Republicans will control those states with such an iron fist, they’ll go ahead and eliminate any nascent Democratic movement with more redistricting and voter suppression.
Just look at what’s happening in Georgia and, crucially, the Supreme Court. Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard arguments in a case of overly restrictive voting laws in Arizona that had been struck down by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. At stake is what remains of the Voting Rights Act, in particular Section 2, which prohibits “voting practices or procedures that discriminate on the basis of race, color, or membership in one of the language minority groups identified in Section 4(f)(2) of the Act.”
In 2013, Chief Justice John Roberts gutted Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which required states with Jim Crow voting histories to pre-clear election law changes with the Department of Justice. His justification? First, that times had changed and racism was solved. Second, he reasoned that Section 2 would continue to protect minority voters, even if it took years of arduous court cases to receive any relief. Now, the 6-3 conservative majority is aiming to pulverize that clause, as well.
Initial reports based on last week’s arguments indicate that the Court is likely leaning toward ruling in Arizona’s favor in at least a narrow decision, with lines like this one, from newly installed Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a pretty solid tell: "There's a difficulty that the statutory language and its lack of clarity presents in trying to figure out when something crosses from an inconvenience to a burden.”
So, basically, instead of trying to navigate a slippery slope, they’re suggesting bulldozing the entire thing, even after the Republican lawyer made startling admissions like this one about why the GOP needs to engage in voter suppression:
“Because it puts us at a competitive disadvantage relative to Democrats. Politics is a zero sum game. And every extra vote they get through unlawful interpretations of Section 2 hurts us. It's the difference between winning an election 50-49 and losing an election.”
This is where we’re at. Republicans are outright admitting that they will cheat (or push the Supreme Court to allow them to cheat) in order to take power. Democrats have a chance to stop them. They just need to use power themselves.