Senate agrees to filibuster changes

Friday, January 25, 2013

— WASHINGTON - The Senate on Thursday changed its rules to make it harder for a single member to slow action on legislation, while continuing to let the minority block bills by insisting on a 60-vote supermajority.

Senators approved the change on a pair of votes; Arkansas’ Sens. Mark Pryor, a Democrat, and John Boozman, a Republican, voted “yes” on both resolutions.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, and Minority Leader Mitch Mc-Connell, a Kentucky Republican, agreed to the plan earlier Thursday in Washington.

The agreement headed off Reid’s threat for Democrats to impose their own rules, which “would have turned gridlock into a meltdown,” said Democratic Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan.

“It’s a baby, baby step,” Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa, who had urged broader rule changes, told reporters. The agreement “does nothing to alter the fact we have now become a de facto, 60-vote Senate” in which support from 60 of the chamber’s 100 members is needed to advance major legislation, he said.

Reid has repeatedly complained that Republicans abuse rules allowing use of the filibuster procedure to block legislation and confirmation of presidential nominees.

While the compromise is not as far-reaching as what Reid and other Democrats had sought, it does pare back the ability of an individual or small group of senators to stall legislation backed by both parties’ leaders. The new rules don’t change the minority’s ability to demand a 60-vote threshold to advance legislation once it has reached the Senate floor. Democrats control 55 Senate votes to 45 for the Republicans.

Harkin said President Barack Obama’s second-term agenda “will not get very far” as long as Republicans can block legislation with 41 votes.“We still have a system here where the minority will decide what happens,” he said.

The compromise measure speeds the process for taking bills to the floor in cases where there’s an agreement that each side will have a chance to offer two amendments to the legislation. It wouldn’t restrict filibusters on passage of legislation or presidential nominations.

Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the chamber’s second-ranking Democrat, said he didn’t know how much difference the changes will make.

“It remains to be seen,” Durbin said. “If there’s a constructive attitude” because leaders reached a bipartisan agreement, “it may help things.” The rules “look acceptable,” said Sen. Mike Johanns, a Nebraska Republican. “I think it’s an attempt to accommodate concerns on both sides.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with Democrats, said theplan “doesn’t go anywhere near far enough in my view.”

“What we have to ask ourselves is: Should we need 60 votes to pass major pieces of legislation? I don’t think we should,” Sanders said.

The rules reduce the maximum debate time, to eight hours from 30 hours, on nominations by the president after they clear the 60-vote threshold for ending a filibuster. That provision wouldn’t apply to federal appellate or Supreme Court nominees or to candidates for Cabinet posts.

The plan excluded a proposal by some Democratic senators, including Harkin, Jeff Merkley of Oregon andTom Udall of New Mexico, to require senators who want to filibuster a bill to hold the floor and speak until one side gives in.

Reid and McConnell also reached an informal agreement to insist that senators who want to continue debate, after 60 or more senators agree to limit it, must take the floor and stay there during the allotted remaining time. Currently, there is no such requirement.

Changing the rules entailed votes on two resolutions. One, aimed at expediting procedures for consideration of legislation and some nominations, was approved 78-16; it needed 60 votes to pass. The other was a change to standing rules for taking measures to the floor and passed 86-9; it had needed 67 votes.

Information for this article was contributed by Chris Strohm and Brian Faler of Bloomberg News.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 01/25/2013