US Senate

Democracy Dilemma: Why Senate Needs a New Rules Keeper

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The Woman Behind The Curtain: Why Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough Must Go

The Woman Behind The Curtain: Why Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough Must GoAlexander Muse – Three days ago, the president of the United States publicly demanded the firing of a woman most Americans have never heard of. Donald Trump went after Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough after she ruled that $1 billion in security funding for the White House, including provisions to protect the East Wing expansion under construction, could not be included in the GOP’s $72 billion immigration enforcement reconciliation package.

MacDonough concluded that the security money was insufficiently budgetary to satisfy the Byrd Rule and therefore could not bypass the 60-vote filibuster threshold. Senate Republicans were forced back to the drawing board to rework the package, with the president’s personal protection detail caught in the procedural crossfire.

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Why JD Vance Cannot Save The Senate

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The Gavel Is Decorative

The Gavel Is Decorative: Why JD Vance Cannot Save The SenateAlexander Muse – A theory has been gathering force on 𝕏 with each new procedural disappointment. The argument goes roughly like this. Vice President JD Vance is president of the Senate. The Senate is failing to deliver. Therefore Vance should stride into the chamber, gavel John Thune aside, fire Elizabeth MacDonough on the spot, force the SAVE America Act to the floor, and rule from the chair that the legislative filibuster is dead.

The frustration animating this theory is entirely legitimate. Republicans hold the White House, the House, and 53 Senate seats, yet the president’s most urgent priorities sit stalled. Anger needs a target. Vance, gavel in hand and presiding over a chamber that refuses to move, is a visible and convenient one.

The theory is also wrong. It is wrong in a specific, structural, and instructive way, and the misunderstanding produces precisely the kind of misdirected political energy that lets the actual obstacles escape accountability. Continue reading →

Democracy, Autocracy . . . or Hypocrisy? 

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filibusterJonathan Turley – According to the Associated Press, President Joe Biden today will support changing the filibuster rule for voting rights legislation — a move widely viewed as effectively killing the rule. The report says that Biden will portray the choice starkly as one between democracy and autocracy.

The AP, however, does not reference the third option of hypocrisy by failing to note that Biden vehemently opposed such moves for decades. He previously denounced killing the rule as “disastrous” for our democracy but now will declare the rule itself to be an existential threat to democracy. It is the latest example of President Biden’s embrace of “whatever it takes politics.”
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Timeline of Joe Biden’s Corruption [Video]

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Biden corruption timelineAlexandra Bruce – I’ve uploaded some videos from Miles Guo’s GTV.org site, which are of interest because they’re produced by Chinese dissidents.

Transcript

Our investigation found that although Joe Biden has never been an honest person and his private life has been criticized by people, Biden didn’t collude with the CCP since the beginning.

His early comments were hawkish. So, when did Biden’s attitude toward the CCP begin to change? In our opinion, since 1997, when Biden became a ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (SFRC), he became a target of CCP infiltration. Continue reading →

McConnell Decides to Support Resolution Condemning the House Impeachment Inquiry

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impeachmentCassandra Fairbanks – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is throwing his support behind a resolution that condemns the House impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump.

Senator Graham’s press office sent out a statement on Thursday saying that they would be introducing a “Graham-McConnell” resolution later that day that will condemn the House of Representatives “closed door, illegitimate impeachment inquiry.”

McConnell told reporters “obviously I support it,” according to a report from The Hill. Continue reading →