The Patriot Post® · McConnell Saves Filibuster, Holder Wants SCOTUS Packed

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Monday relinquished his demand that Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) agree to preserving the filibuster in their power-sharing agreement. With the Senate split 50-50, Schumer had repeatedly rejected McConnell’s demand to agree to preserve the filibuster, which saves minority bargaining power by necessitating a 60-vote threshold to pass legislation. Schumer predictably asserted that he would not allow McConnell and the minority to dictate the terms of sharing power. Clearly, compromise is a term Schumer loves to conflate with “unfair demands.” Unity™.

Irrespective of Schumer’s objections, McConnell got what he wanted. “Two Democrat senators publicly confirmed they will not vote to end the legislative filibuster,” he explained. “They agree with President [Joe] Biden’s and my view that no Senate majority should destroy the right of future minorities of both parties to help shape legislation.” Those two Democrat senators are Joe Manchin (WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ). Furthermore, Democrats Amy Klobuchar (MN) and Chris Murphy (CT) have also expressed their misgivings about ending the filibuster with the real possibility of Republicans regaining the majority in 2022.

That isn’t the only battle in the now-Democrat Senate. The hard Left is stumping for court packing and DC statehood. Barack Obama’s bag man, er, Attorney General Eric Holder blasted Democrats for not pushing the issue hard enough. “It is painfully clear Democrats and progressives are uncomfortable with the acquisition and use of power, while Republicans and conservatives never have been,” Holder laughably claimed. (The exact opposite is, of course, the truth.) He then asserted, “Our courts badly need reforms.” Translation: He doesn’t like that Donald Trump appointed a bunch of constitutionalist judges and justices.

Holder’s revisionist history lesson continued as he claimed, “The Republicans have abused their power to give themselves an unfair advantage. It is necessary and totally appropriate to add seats [to the Supreme Court]. … What Mitch McConnell and Republicans have done is create a crisis of legitimacy.” How quickly Holder forgets — or rather intentionally ignores — the fact that it was Democrats who started the Senate down this path. Then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), in a blatant power play to enable Barack Obama to politicize the courts in the Democrats’ favor, triggered the “nuclear option,” ending the filibuster over judicial nominations. It was McConnell who warned that the Democrats would come to regret it.

With 62% of the country opposed to packing the Supreme Court, Holder is attempting to browbeat Democrats into seeing this as an essential platform issue. Evidently, anything that undercuts the ability for Republicans to fairly win elections or find success in promoting their own policy agenda should be opposed vigorously because Holder and company are all about “saving American democracy,” or whatever.