Senate Republicans Flirt With Nuking the Filibuster

[Celerity]

GOP Senators are chipping away at the 60-vote threshold, marking one more step toward majority rule in the upper chamber.

https://newrepublic.com/article/195647/senate-republicans-going-nuclear-filibuster

https://archive.ph/0Ogs4


Senate Majority Leader John Thune conducts a news conference after the Senate luncheons in the U.S. Capitol on May 20.

It’s a tale as old as time—or, rather, roughly as old as a seventh grader: The party controlling the Senate takes action to weaken the filibuster, and the minority party warns of a tyrannical majoritarian upper chamber that will undermine its perhaps outdated reputation as the “cooling saucer” of Congress.

The latest salvo in this long-running conflict occurred on Wednesday, when Senate Republicans pressed forward with a simple-majority vote to overturn California’s electric vehicle mandate, despite an assessment by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office, or GAO, that it should be subject to the 60-vote filibuster threshold. Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, who advises the upper chamber on proper procedure, has sided with the GAO on this issue, and Democrats warn that moving forward would set a dangerous precedent in weakening the filibuster.

“No, this isn’t the same as killing the filibuster. This actually goes way, way beyond that. First, they are doing more than going nuclear on the parliamentarian. They are going nuclear on the Congressional Review Act itself,” argued Senator Alex Padilla of California in a speech ahead of the vote.

Let’s rewind a bit—about 30 years ago, to be precise. Since 1996, the Congressional Review Act, or CRA, has allowed Congress to overturn executive agency rules under expedited procedures, meaning that it is not subject to the filibuster, but instead can be vacated with a simple majority threshold. OK, now fast-forward: In 2024, the Biden administration granted California a waiver to implement an electric vehicle mandate. The GAO assessed that this waiver did not count as an executive agency rule, meaning that it could not be subject to the CRA.

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