Harry Reid is one unhappy Democrat. With his job as Senate Majority Leader on the line in the coming elections, the Nevada senator has come up with a new and unique complaint. He is upset that Republicans failed to obstruct a constitutional amendment he has championed for months, and which he had brought to the Senate floor on Monday for a preliminary vote.
Yes, it sounds odd, especially given that Reid complains so often about Republican obstructionism. But when Reid scheduled Monday’s cloture vote on a proposed amendment to the Constitution limiting the freedom of political speech, he intended for Republicans to shut it down quickly. Instead, they voted to advance it to a full floor debate and an up-or-down vote.
This means there will now be a long debate over the constitutional amendment by Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M. It will provide Reid with ample time to denounce the billionaire libertarian Koch Brothers to his heart’s content. But Reid doesn’t really want this. Not only might this debate become harmful to his cause (Democrats are, after all, trying to change the Bill of Rights) but it leaves less floor time to bring other symbolic measures up for a vote. Specifically, the debate over the Udall amendment complicates Reid’s plans to hold equally meaningless, politically charged votes on bills to raise the minimum wage and make it easier to sue over gender pay inequality. Reid is aiming to recess the Senate by Sept. 23 to give Democrats time to campaign for re-election.
Reid now fumes that Republicans have advanced his own bill in order to “stall” the Senate. But no one has wasted as much Senate time as Reid has. The Udall amendment – like the minimum wage and gender pay measures which it will now squeeze for Senate floor time – was only brought to the floor as a political stunt. It was intended as a cynical means of stoking liberal angst over the Koch brothers‘ donations to political causes, so as to improve email fundraising for Democrats ahead of the election. It wasn’t supposed to create a public debate over the merits of limiting the freedom of speech in order to curtail the power of wealth in politics.
There is only one remaining important piece of Senate business before this fall’s election: To keep the government funded and running after the current fiscal appropriations expire on Sept. 30. Both houses of Congress will need to pass a short-term continuing resolution to prevent what Reid recently referred to as “another disastrous government shutdown.” This is because Reid’s Senate has failed to pass either a budget or a single appropriations bill this year.
Instead of using the last seconds of this year’s Senate term to negotiate an appropriations deal and avoid a shutdown, Reid has crammed the schedule with this series of political votes. Even if his irresponsible behavior fails to provoke a government shutdown like the one that occurred last fall, he has already shut down any serious business in the United States Senate.
