
Mike Lee
@BasedMikeLee • 704,224 subscribers
Pass the SAVE America Act—now!
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I’d love to keep the filibuster and make filibustering senators speak That’s how the filibuster is supposed to work—protecting robust debate in the Senate It no longer does that; it now forestalls debate Enforce the filibuster Or nuke it The status quo empowers Democrats
Mike Lee22,495,333 次观看 • 4 个月前

John Thune is mistaken. We *do* have the votes to pass the SAVE America Act—because we have a simple majority. All we lack is the will to enforce the talking filibuster (requiring filibustering senators to speak), and to stay in session continuously until it passes. It’d pass.
Mike Lee520,008 次观看 • 8 天前

“It takes 60 votes to pass a bill in the Senate, right?” No; it takes 60 votes to achieve cloture—a mechanism to bring debate to a close Passing a bill takes a simple majority It’s possible to pass legislation without cloture when no one’s speaking End the zombie filibuster
Mike Lee12,153,794 次观看 • 8 个月前

I was in the courtroom today (at the invitation of Erika Kirk) when Judge Graf admitted evidence that Tyler Robinson confessed repeatedly to killing Charlie Kirk—to Lance Twigs and to his gaming friends. Twigs and Robinson’s gaming friends were initially incredulous, but Robinson continued to insist that he did it, insisting “it was me.” Robinson provided more detail to Twigs, admitting that the murder was premeditated and motivated by hate. The prosecution team did a fantastic job, and Judge Graf reached the right conclusion.
Mike Lee726,248 次观看 • 2 个月前

My colleague from South Dakota suggests here that the talking filibuster hasn’t been used in a century, and that it was not used to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964. He’s mistaken. As I’ve explained to the entire Senate GOP on multiple occasions, the talking filibuster *was* used effectively to break the weeks-long filibuster mounted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Leader Thune and others point out that the Senate ultimately invoked cloture on the Civil Rights Act, and on that basis wrongly conclude that the talking filibuster was *not* the tool used to achieve that victory. This argument ignores the fact that this is *how* the Senate closed a staggering 30-vote cloture deficit in 1964. After many weeks of fighting a losing battle, filibustering senators predictably started to lose their resolve to hold up the bill indefinitely, especially when they realized how hard they’d have to work to keep the effort alive. So they started proposing and supporting amendments to the bill to make it more palatable and help them save face. I still maintain that this is a viable approach that could work well—even better—in the context of the SAVE America Act, especially considering that the bill is less complicated and less controversial with voters than was the Civil Rights Act, and currently has a cloture deficit of only 10 votes—tiny compared to the 30-vote deficit faced by the Civil Rights Act of 1964. My colleague also mistakenly suggests that Senate Republicans would have to vote to enforce the talking filibuster. That simply isn’t true; no vote is required for this step. All we need is a majority leader willing to announce that we’re getting on the bill and that we will continue to debate it until it passes—all with the understanding that if filibustering senators fail to show up to debate it, we can “call the question” and pass it with a simple majority. That understanding, in turn, is what motivates the filibustering senators to show up and speak, but it’s also what naturally causes them to tire of the exercise after a few weeks, at which point they start looking for a face-saving off-ramp. Finally, Leader Thune suggests that the talking filibuster would be thwarted by being “reset” every time Democrats offered an amendment. There’s a valid point in there, but it’s not a good reason not to invoke the talking filibuster. It appears he’s referring indirectly to paragraph 1(a) of Senate Rule 19 (the two-speech rule). While offering a new amendment can create a new question under longstanding practice, the September 25, 1986 precedent narrowed how rigidly the two-speech rule is applied by clarifying that many procedural actions do not count as speeches at all. Particularly in light of that 1986 clarification, it’s been a long time since I’ve suggested we consider rigid enforcement of Rule 19’s two-speech limit as part of a talking filibuster strategy for the SAVE America Act. We don’t need it! Nor was that rule aggressively enforced during the Senate’s consideration of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Majority Leader Mike Mansfield correctly focused on requiring actual debate from filibustering senators rather than looking for technical ways to shut the debate down. To give credit where it’s due, I appreciate what Leader Thune said in this interview about the possibility of passing some iteration of SAVE America using budget reconciliation—a procedure in which there is no 60-vote cloture hurdle. I’ve been skeptical of this approach in the past, but I’m starting to believe the SAVE America Act has more budgetary features than I initially considered possible. That said, reconciliation is fraught with all kinds of problems, challenges, risks, and uncertainties. Also, failure can be far too easy to blame on the parliamentarian. I’m open to considering the reconciliation path, but we should make this decision with our eyes open. To do that, we need to separate fact from fiction when it comes to the talking filibuster.
Mike Lee428,603 次观看 • 1 个月前

When I speak in support of the SAVE America Act, some Republicans tell me to stop, insisting that it’s a lost cause and we have to move on Others chime in to say “remove Thune or your words mean nothing” I emphatically reject both of these arguments I explain why in this video
Mike Lee909,250 次观看 • 3 个月前
