What Did Biden Mean Regarding the Filibuster?
Parsing the president’s recent comments during his town hall in Cincinnati, Ohio
I recently wrote that progressives should stop yelling at President Biden to do something about the filibuster because it’s an issue that’s out of his hands. And broadly speaking I still agree with this argument, but two things have somewhat shifted my thinking.
The first was a post from Harold Meyerson at The American Prospect, which reported that:
Day before yesterday, I heard that a prominent Democrat had had meetings with both President Biden and West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, and came away with a surprising conclusion: that Manchin was ultimately OK with ending the filibuster, but that Biden was determined to keep it.
The second was the comments that the president made during his town hall with CNN in Cincinnati, Ohio. According to the New York Times, President Biden:
Endorsed a return to the “talking filibuster,” where senators must actually hold the floor and make speeches (or read Dr. Seuss) to maintain a filibuster.
Said that the filibuster is being abused, is a Jim Crow relic, and that the fight over it is a distraction being used by the GOP to change the topic from the rest of his agenda.
Emphasized the importance of voting rights legislation, but argued that he could find some Republican votes to pass a bill in a bipartisan manner
Made a convoluted statement about ending (or maybe protecting?) the filibuster leading to nothing getting done.
As to the Meyerson reporting, I’d take it with a grain of salt simply because we don’t know who the anonymous “prominent Democrat” is — it could be true but it could also be hearsay. On to the town hall comments. Though I’d prefer scrapping the filibuster entirely, I would prefer a talking filibuster over the status quo, and I agree with the president on point (2). As to the third point, I admire the sentiment but I strongly doubt that it’s possible to find 10 Republicans in the Senate for a voting bill.
On point (4), I want to quote President Biden in full:
There’s no reason to protect it [the filibuster] other than you’re going to throw the entire Congress into chaos and nothing will get done. Nothing at all will get done.
What’s unclear about his statement is that it can be read in two very different ways. Interpretation A is that Biden is saying that if you remove the filibuster you will throw Congress into chaos and nothing will get done. Interpretation B is Biden saying that the only reason to protect the filibuster is to throw Congress into chaos and ensure that nothing will get done. The former seems more plausible on the phrasing of the statement in isolation, as well as Biden’s general belief in bipartisanship and views of old Senate traditions; the latter seems more likely based on Biden calling the filibuster a Jim Crow relic and noting that it has been abused and needs some sort of reform.
The bottom line is that it’s unclear what Biden actually meant to say about the filibuster. I personally hope his views are more in line with Interpretation B, but my gut feeling (and the Meyerson reporting, if true) point towards Interpretation A, which is unfortunate. Regardless, I still don’t think that yelling at him about this is a good use of people’s time.