The long-shot plan to exempt the debt ceiling from the filibuster floated by Senate Democrats was dead on arrival after Sen. Joe Manchin announced his opposition, leaving them one gigantic vote short.
The West Virginia Democrat said Wednesday he would not support a filibuster “carveout” for raising the federal debt limit to sidestep Senate Republicans’ refusal to provide enough support to meet the required 60-vote threshold. That leaves Democrats reliant on using President Joe Biden’s massive “reconciliation” spending package to maintain the nation’s borrowing power, a legislative strategy Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York is desperate to avoid.
“I’ve been very, very clear where I stand on the filibuster,” Manchin told reporters. “Nothing changes.”
Senate Democrats are clinging to a 50-seat “majority” that rests on Vice President Kamala Harris’s tiebreaking vote. This slim advantage has made it difficult for Democrats to ignore Republicans and work their will, leading liberal activists to pressure Manchin to support eliminating the filibuster altogether. But the senator is holding to the position he has staked out for several months, saying the late October deadline to increase the debt ceiling has not changed his mind.
The matter was considered settled until Biden, on Tuesday, suggested Senate Democrats might vote to create a filibuster carveout in order to increase the debt ceiling outside of the reconciliation package. Those comments led some of Manchin’s Democratic colleagues to suggest the legislative maneuver was in the offing if Republicans did not supply the votes necessary to raise the debt limit in a scheduled Wednesday afternoon vote. (As expected, they did not.)
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In any event, Manchin put the kibosh on such speculation hours before the vote, leaving Senate Democrats back at square one. The West Virginian is interested in preserving Senate rules and believes exempting the debt ceiling from the filibuster would lead to all legislation eventually being exempted, especially as pressure for more carveouts mounted. True, Manchin could back down. But one Democratic operative who has followed his career in Washington called that possibility unlikely.
“I have never heard him be willing to compromise on this position for anyone,” this Democrat said, explaining Manchin’s position. “For him, it’s not a, well if it’s just for this, I’ll do it. Because the minute you do this, you ruin the Senate.”
Since mid-summer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky has urged Democrats to include a debt ceiling hike in Biden’s $3.5 trillion reconciliation spending package, warning there would not be sufficient Republican votes to meet the 60-vote threshold. Democrats are mired in negotiations between liberals and centrists in the House and the Senate over the final contours of the bill. They argue there is not enough time, given the late October deadline.
Republicans claim otherwise.
McConnell said Wednesday the minority would keep its powder dry and refrain from using parliamentary tactics to delay passage of the reconciliation bill. Additionally, as an olive branch, McConnell announced Republicans would facilitate a short-term debt hike — essentially, they would not filibuster it, giving Democrats more time to clear the legislation. The move appeared partly an effort to keep Manchin from abandoning his fidelity to the filibuster amid pressure to avoid a federal default.
“Unified Democratic government had two and a half months to address the debt limit through reconciliation,” McConnell said in a statement. “Whether through miscalculation or a deliberate effort to bully their own members into wrecking the Senate, top Democrats have risked” the nation’s ability to borrow money and pay its bills.
Meanwhile, Manchin is not the Democrats’ only holdout when it comes to efforts to liberal efforts to weaken the filibuster, or at the very least, create an exception for increasing the amount of money the Treasury is permitted to borrow. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who, like Manchin, opposes the size and scope of the $3.5 trillion reconciliation package in its current form, also opposes junking the filibuster.
Sinema has kept her own counsel during negotiations over reconciliation, avoiding reporters’ questions on that issue as well as the debt limit. But the senator has given no indication that her position on the filibuster has softened with the deadline to raise the debt ceiling looming. With polls showing Biden’s job approval ratings as underwater, it is not clear Sinema is under much pressure to buckle in a purple state such as Arizona.
“She, both privately and publicly, kind of presents as the same — moderate in temperament and in policy,” said a Democratic operative who has observed Sinema during her rise from the Arizona Legislature in Phoenix to the Senate in Washington.
Not inconsequential is the fact that altering or eliminating the filibuster could only be done using the so-called nuclear option.
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Under Senate rules, a supermajority of senators is required to make changes to the rule book. Doing so on a partisan basis, with just 51 votes, is referred to as the nuclear option because it is essentially breaking the rules to change the rules. Both parties have used the nuclear option to get rid of the 60-vote threshold for various categories of judicial nominees. It has never been used to ease the passage of legislation.
Manchin and Sinema would likely take issue with this process, never mind the outcome.
