It’s the Filibuster, Stupid

Trump had another whiny press conference yesterday, and he made some offhand comments about packing the court. That has to mean that one of his minions, probably Miller, mentioned it to him. But Trump basically rejected it out of hand, insofar as he says anything that makes sense when he yammers.

This should serve as your regular reminder that the filibuster benefits Republicans more than it does Democrats. Thune is not entertaining removal of the filibuster to pass the latest Jim Crow voting law, and he’s not going to entertain it to pack the court. This isn’t because he doesn’t want Jim Crow and court packing — it’s that he realizes that Republicans are heading for a drubbing, and if they lose the Senate in 2026 or 2028, Thune wants to be able to obstruct from the minority.

If you’re faced with a country that already gives rural states an outsized say in one of the bodies of Congress, it is insanity for the party of urban states to endorse a rule that gives those states even more power. This is really simple, and Thune’s behavior shows just how much he wants to keep that power.

If we let him keep that power, it doesn’t matter if the next President is AOC, Newsom, Pritzker, Beshear, Bozo the Clown or Batman. They won’t get anything done because it will all stall in the Senate, just as it did in the Obama Administration. That’s what Republicans want, and it’s insane that a good number of Democratic Senators want to give it to them.