Senate Republicans are acting in “bad faith” in order to pass the bulk of President Donald Trump’s agenda into a single bill, according to MSNBC opinion writer and editor Hayes Brown.
The GOP needs to “rely on a set of rules that will allow it to dodge a potential filibuster” in order to pass Trump’s spending bill.
“A crafty move from Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., last week may ensure even more of the pet policy projects stuffed inside the House’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ make it to President Trump’s desk than would have previously been possible,” Brown said.
The move he is talking about is using the Congressional Review Act to bypass democrats' attempts to filibuster. In order to vote on anything in the Senate, members have to motion for “cloture,” which basically means “we’re done debating this issue and ready to vote.”
Cloture requires 60 senators to vote yes. If they don't have 60 Senators, the debate can go on, and the legislation can’t be brought to a floor vote.
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The exception to this rule is for the budget, however, but nothing “unrelated can be crammed inside,” Brown wrote. “The Congressional Review Act is one of the other exceptions that allows a majority to move on a substantive piece of legislation without hitting the filibuster, which brings us back to Thune’s recent trickery.”
Senate Democrats are right that “the GOP is acting in bad faith on their promises to uphold the filibuster and follow the parliamentarian’s advice,” Brown said.
“I haven’t had any change of heart since Trump took office and still think the filibuster is an outdated, unconstitutional relic that needs to go.” Brown later added, “But I do think that if Thune wanted to repeal it outright, that would be preferable to trying to sneak his way around it and violating the spirit of the law in the process.”