WASHINGTON – Democratic lawmakers will mark the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday by failing to keep a promise to vote on a Senate rule change intended to advance a voting rights bill.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced Thursday that the Senate will not take The House of Representatives passed the voting rights legislation until Tuesday, missing its deadline to vote on a rule change before the federal holiday honoring the late civil rights leader.
The New York Democrat cited a winter storm over the weekend and Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz’s positive COVID-19 diagnosis for the delay in the vote. Without Schatz, the Democrats do not have the 50 votes needed for a simple majority.
Although Schumer remains committed to bringing the legislation to a vote, passage of a voting rights bill remains stymied by opposition Republicans and Democratic Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin, who oppose changing the Senate’s rules to pass the law without the support of the Republican Party.
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The upcoming vote comes after President Joe Biden’s failed effort on Capitol Hill to persuade Senate Democrats to pass a voting rights bill, and a week in which he traveled to Atlanta and gave a speech encouraging lawmakers to lift the legislative hurdle that has allowed Republicans to stall. large part of his agenda: the filibuster.
On Thursday, the president suggested he could show up empty-handed.
“I hope we can do this. The honest answer to God is that I don’t know if we can do this,” Biden said after their meeting on Capitol Hill.
Meanwhile, House Democrats say they won’t give up on passing a federal voting rights bill, which Democrats see as necessary to counter election laws in GOP-led states. which, according to them, are restrictive. They have continued to pressure their Senate counterparts to pass election legislation, despite the uphill battle they face.
In a letter to her colleagues on Friday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., wrote, “We cannot and will not rest until this legislation becomes law.”
“The Senate must do its part to promote this legislation. At stake is nothing less than our democracy,” Pelosi said.
The House of Representatives passed a bill Thursday morning that combines two pieces of voting rights legislation, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act, and is now sent to the Senate.
The Freedom to Vote Act establishes minimum federal requirements for early voting and voting by mail, while the John Lewis Voting Rights Act reinstates Justice Department oversight of election law changes in states that have a history of discrimination.
Republicans have accused Democrats of trying to pass a federal election bill that benefits them.
“This is not about ‘voting rights,'” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, said in December, “it’s just a power grab.”
At the center of the voting rights talk is the filibuster, a 60-vote threshold needed to bring bills up for debate. Biden and most Democrats want to make a filibuster exception to allow a voting rights bill to pass with a majority vote, but without Manchin and Sinema, they don’t have the support to change the rules.
Biden on the filibuster:‘May the Majority Prevail’: Biden Backs Obstructionist Change to Pass Voting Rights in Atlanta Speech
Members of the Congressional Black Caucus publicly called on the Senate to reverse the filibuster during a news conference on Wednesday.
“We’re calling on the Senate to vote. We’re asking the Senate to have that debate because we want to pass the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. We want to pass the Freedom to Vote Act,” the CBC president said. . Representative Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio.
“It excites me, when I think of a black woman, I must stand here today before we are asked to do something that the last five presidents have done, and four white Republican presidents, reauthorize the Voting Rights Act,” added Beatty.
Representative Hakeem Jeffries, DN.Y. he said both voting rights bills must be passed “by any means necessary” and supported “reforming a filibuster rule that is leaking into racist history.”
“There can be no celebration without liberation, without freedom, without the right to vote. As we prepare to commemorate the birthday of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, let us remember that justice delayed may be justice denied. The time to act is now,” he said. Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Alabama, the lawmaker who authored the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.
But not all supporters of the electoral bill remain positive.
Civil rights leaders said Biden’s speech in Atlanta came too late; the president should already have been on Capitol Hill working on deals to pass a voting rights bill.
Jerry Gonzalez, CEO of GALEO Impact Fund, Inc., a Latino civic engagement organization in Georgia, he said Biden touted his years of experience in the Senate and how he was able to get things done during his presidential campaign.
Meet the Senate. Get to know the institution. He was there when the deals associated with the Affordable Care Act were made. You have to make deals,” González said in a call with reporters on Wednesday. “Carrots and sticks should be used. We need the full force of the presidency to ensure that he can deliver on his agenda, including accountability to his friends within the party.”
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Kendra Cotton, director of operations for Stacey Abrams’ voting rights organization, the New Georgia Project, agreed.
“It’s not up to us on this call to tell you how to do this,” he said. “He told us that’s what he knew how to do. And all we’re asking is that he deliver. That’s it… It’s like, sir, please tell us how you’re going to do this.”
Republican opposition to changing the filibuster means Schumer won’t have the 60 votes needed to start debate on the bill.
Sinema reiterated her opposition to changing the filibuster during a surprise speech less than an hour before Biden met with lawmakers on Thursday.
“Removing the 60-vote threshold will simply ensure that we lose a critical tool we need to safeguard our democracy from threats for years to come,” the Arizona Democrat said.
After the Biden meeting, Manchin declared once again that he would not agree to create a filibuster exception for voting rights. saying in a statement, “As I have said before, I will not vote to remove or weaken filibuster.”
Biden met with Manchin and Sinema on Thursday night. But neither Democrat has publicly changed his position.
Plus:As the right to vote fades, Biden’s failure to unite his own party looms again
Contributing: Deborah Berry
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism