Comment by overboard2

3 years ago

The one person performing a filibuster is presumably doing so very much on record, complete with soundbites.

14 comments

overboard2

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yamtaddle  3 years ago

That's not the kind anyone means anymore, at least when it comes up in relation to the US Senate. They generally don't actually filibuster, they place a procedural hold that requires 60 members to agree to override it.

  • lumost  3 years ago

    This is where the insanity really started. It used to require 8-20 senators to physically filibuster to actually kill a bill. On a major bill, the small number of senators also risked reputational harm from the sound bites of them reading their phone books.

    Now anyone can start a filibuster, it largely goes unrecorded - and pressure for party unity prevents it from being killed.

rpearl  3 years ago

No, fillibusters are a matter of procedure now. Nobody's standing up there talking to perform a fillibuster anymore.

From https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/filibustering-in-the-mod...

"When a Senator signals the intent to filibuster, an informal cloture process starts to determine if 60 votes exist to move a measure forward in two ways. One cloture vote is to approve a motion to consider a measure; the second vote is on the actual measure. If either cloture vote fails, the measure remains in limbo. "

  • Kon-Peki  3 years ago

    If you want to see a real filibuster in action, go to Nebraska!

    Machaela Cavanaugh has been filibustering the legislature for weeks! 12+ hours a day, weeks on end. She has monumentally impressive resolve.

    Actually, I think you missed it. The Nebraska legislature finally passed a bill today.

    • eek2121  3 years ago

      That is great and all, but what folks are communicating here is quite different. Filibusters in the Senate do not require you to even show up, you can simply claim a filibuster to stop a vote from happening.

sanderjd  3 years ago

You don't deserve to be downvoted for just not knowing that this isn't how the filibuster works anymore. All the well known pop culture treatments of it - Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The West Wing, etc. - show this form of it.