Biden backs filibuster reform, not elimination
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As debate over what to do with the filibuster rages on in the Senate, President Joe Biden in a TV interview aired Wednesday, said for the first time he backs reforming, rather than scrapping, the long-standing Senate procedure, which essentially allows the minority to block legislation.
Biden, who served 36 years in the Senate, told ABC News he supported changing the filibuster rule back to requiring that senators talk continuously on the chamber's floor to hold up a bill, returning it to "what it used to be when I first got to the Senate back in the old days. You had to stand up and command the floor. You had to keep talking."
Top Democrats, including the two highest-ranking party members in the Senate, have stepped up rhetoric in recent days about the future of the filibuster, which requires support from 60 of the chamber's 100 members to pass most legislation -- effectively giving power to the minority party in a closely-divided chamber.
With the current Senate split 50-50, Democrats have said they may need to do away with the filibuster to pass Biden's priorities, including a bill intended to facilitate voting in elections.
This sudden sense of urgency comes as Republican legislatures across the country are trying to limit voting access. Democrats have said this is an effort by Republicans to gain an electoral edge by making it harder for millions of Americans to vote.
On Tuesday after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell warned Democrats that ending the long-standing Senate procedure would bring the Democratic president's agenda to a standstill, and threatened to retaliate.
McConnell spoke a day after Senator Dick Durbin, the chamber's No. 2 Democrat, said in a floor speech that the filibuster was making a "mockery" of democracy and that Republicans were misusing it to block urgent legislation.
Two moderate Senate Democrats - Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin - have opposed doing away with the filibuster, though Manchin has suggested changing the rule to make the parliamentary maneuver more "painful."
