'Dumb': WSJ editorial warns Trump's wild demand will send GOP into devastating trap

As President Donald Trump grows increasingly shocked and frustrated that Democrats in Congress haven't caved to him yet in the weekslong federal government shutdown, he is ramping up demands for Republicans in the Senate to do away with the legislative filibuster — the rule requiring 60 votes to pass most bills — and steamroll Democrats to reopen the government without them.

“Republicans, you will rue the day that you didn’t TERMINATE THE FILIBUSTER!!! BE TOUGH, BE SMART, AND WIN!!!" Trump recently posted to Truth Social. "This is much bigger than the Shutdown, this is the survival of our Country!”

But this would be a huge mistake, warned the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board. In fact, he would deliver the whole GOP into a trap that hands Democrats far more power in the long run.

"Republicans would be dumb and hurt the country by breaking the filibuster," wrote the board. "Republicans could end the government shutdown on a partisan vote, but then what? The GOP will have taken the fraught step of breaking the filibuster for appropriations. Democrats will pound the table in faux outrage, but they’ll privately be cheering at what they’ll be able to pass the next time they control Washington — perhaps as soon as 2029 when Mr. Trump is out of office."

"Break the filibuster for the shutdown, and it will soon be gone for all legislation too. The Senate will then operate like the House, where a simple majority rules," wrote the board.

Indeed, they noted, had the filibuster not been in place for the first two years of the Biden administration, Republicans may have been powerless to stop a parade of progressive legislation: "Bernie Sanders’s $17-an-hour national minimum wage; All of the Biden Build Back Better plan, with its huge tax increases and cradle-to-grave entitlement programs; Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s bill to restructure the Supreme Court; Nancy Pelosi’s bill to nationalize election law in all 50 states on the California model; Statehood for Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia, with four new Democratic Senators; The PRO Act that would repeal much of Taft-Hartley on unionization and ban right-to-work laws for voluntary union membership that exist in 26 states; [and] a national law codifying Roe v. Wade abortion standards."

Republicans may not even be able to reverse all these things with the filibuster gone when they take power next, the board wrote; "Look at the trouble Republicans are having even letting supercharged pandemic-era ObamaCare subsidies expire."

"The filibuster rule is often frustrating, but its virtue is that it serves as a check on passing extreme laws with narrow majorities," the board argued in conclusion, warning, "Most Republicans understand this. But some Senators, hoping to curry favor, may start to echo the President’s short-term opportunism. The Democratic left is quietly cheering them on."