The “filibuster”, a parliamentary tradition that Biden wants to destroy – The HuffPost

Evelyn Hockstein via Reuters

UNITED STATES – The American president on Tuesday, January 11 called on the American Senate to bypass a firmly established tradition, called “filibuster”, to force its way through his great electoral reform.

What does this parliamentary rule consist of? Joe biden plans to dismantle in order to protect access to vote of minorities in the face of attacks from republicans? We explain this in detail below.

The origin

For a long time, the United States Senate did not impose a limit on the length of debate on its bills. This possibility of obstruction allowed parliamentarians to prevent a text from being put to a vote. We then spoke of “filibuster”, a word derived from the French “flibustier”, since they “pirated” the closure of the debates.

Since 1917, senators can decide to stop these debates, provided they collect enough votes. Today, 60 senators out of 100 are needed for the bill to be put to a vote. However, in a Congress where Democrats and Republicans each have 50 seats, this supermajority is almost unattainable on the most sensitive subjects, which, since the start of Joe Biden’s mandate, has blocked most of his initiatives.

“To protect democracy, I support any change in the rules of the Senate, whatever it is,” the US president said on Tuesday.

Can it be deleted?

Rather than abandoning the “filibuster” rule entirely, Democrats are considering triggering a “nuclear option,” which would allow senators to exceptionally vote the president’s vast electoral reform by a simple majority.

This option is thus nicknamed because it breaks abruptly with the tradition, raising the risk of an escalation during the next change of majority.

To trigger the “nuclear option”, however, Democrats need the support of their entire camp. However, several Democratic senators, including West Virginia elected official Joe Manchin, have already expressed their skepticism.

The Republican opposition is standing up against any reform of the “filibuster”, assuring that this would amount to “breaking the Senate” and giving the Democrats inordinate power.

In 2017, the Republicans had yet used this famous option to lower the threshold to 51 votes for life appointments to the Supreme Court, causing an outcry among the Democrats.

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