Lindsey Graham blames Reid for GOP's record filibusters
February 14, 2010
On Fox News Sunday, Graham implied Majority Leader Harry Reid forced so many filibusters by allowing so many bills and refusing Republican amendments.
When asked about the GOP's use of the filibuster, Graham said, "Harry Reid put more bills in -- into the hopper and filled up the tree, shedding out Republican amendments [more] than anybody I know of, but we're all in this together."
The senior Senator from South Carolina quickly changed the subject to national security. "I will meet the president more than halfway and help him close Guantanamo Bay, only if he creates a legal system to make us safe and keep this enemy off the battlefield in a transparent way living within our values," Graham told Fox News' Chris Wallace Sunday.
"So I think we need to stop all this fighting amongst ourselves and direct our fight toward our enemies," concluded Graham.
Republicans used the filibuster 112 times in the 110th Congress. The filibuster was used 54 times in the 109th Congress.
Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) called the use of filibusters "unprecedented" when they reached 100. "The Republicans' whole political strategy is for this President and for this Congress to fail," he said on ABC last month.
"All our Republican colleagues have said is no," he went on to say. "They have used the filibuster, a procedure in the Senate to stop progress, 101 times, unprecedented in the history of the United States Senate!"
Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) said later that same week that Democrats would be on trial for treason if they employed Republican tactics.
This video is from Fox's Fox News Sunday, broadcast Feb. 14, 2010.
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