Sen. Kyrsten Sinema faces new pressure to reject filibuster after Roe overturned

The Supreme Court's bombshell ruling overturning Roe v. Wade has put new pressure on Sen. Kyrsten Sinema to support ending the Senate's filibuster rule, but she is holding firm to her decision to preserve it.

Attention returned to the procedural hurdle, which requires 60-votes to proceed with legislation in the 100-member Senate, after President Joe Biden said Thursday that the filibuster should be lifted as a result of the court's decision.

"I believe we have to codify Roe v. Wade in the law," Biden said. "And the way to do that is to make sure the Congress votes to do that. And if the filibuster gets in the way, it's like voting rights — it should be we provide an exception to this."

Sinema and Sen. Joe Manchin D-W.V., who also is in favor of keeping the filibuster, are viewed by many Democrats as standing in the way of nationalizing abortion rights. The Senate is evenly divided 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans and does not have 60 votes in favor of enshrining Roe in federal law. This supermajority is needed to end debate on bill and proceed to a vote on the measure.

Sinema remains unmoved in her support for the filibuster.

The Gaggle: Roe v. Wade has been overturned. What's next for Arizona?

When asked whether Sinema would support eliminating the filibuster to codify Roe, her office said in a written statement to The Arizona Republic: "Senator Sinema’s position on the filibuster has not changed."

Manchin also still supports the legislative maneuver, according to multiple press reports.

The high court's recent decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization returns to the states the authority to decide on abortion's legality.

With two abortion laws on the books, Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich said Wednesday that he believes the pre-statehood ban on all abortions takes precedent over the legislation that prohibits most abortions after 15 weeks.

Sinema and Manchin's stances on the filibuster trended Thursday on Twitter.

Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., a possible Sinema primary challenger, tweeted in response to a threat from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., to squash the United States Innovation and Competition Act of 2021 if Democrats continued to push for a "partisan reconciliation bill."

"Only reason he can make that threat is because he knows @Sen_JoeManchin and @SenatorSinema empower by not neutering the filibuster," Gallego tweeted Thursday.

On June 24, Sinema wrote a two-part tweet in response to the Supreme Court's decision:

"A woman’s health care decisions should be between her, her family, and her doctor. Today's decision overturning Roe v. Wade endangers the health and wellbeing of women in Arizona and across America. Throughout my time in Congress, I’ve always supported women’s access to health care, and I’ll continue working with anyone to protect women’s ability to make decisions about their futures."

Much of the response online was negative, with some questioning Sinema's support of women's reproductive rights.

The first comment on her second post stated: "Except you made it so they couldn't codify it??"

Another person wrote in response to the passage of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, the most significant gun reform legislation in years, which Sinema was instrumental in writing and passing.

Still, Sinema does support abortion rights and is a co-sponsor of the Women’s Health Protection Act.

After the leaked draft of the Dobson case was leaked in May, Sinema's office released a statement saying, “Protections in the Senate safeguarding against the erosion of women's access to health care have been used half-a-dozen times in the past ten years, and are more important now than ever."

She reiterated this view in an op-ed last year, arguing that the filibuster has been used to protect abortion rights.

The filibuster was used in 2006, 2018 and twice in 2015 and 2020 to kill legislation that limited women's abortion access.

Tara Kavaler is a politics reporter at The Arizona Republic. She can be reached by email at tara.kavaler@arizonarepublic.com or on Twitter @kavalertara.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Sinema faces new pressure to reject filibuster after Roe overturned