Speaker Johnson doubles down on defense of filibuster
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) doubled down on his support for the Senate filibuster, even as President Trump has pushed the upper chamber to use the so-called “nuclear option” to forgo it and reopen the government with a simple majority vote.
At a press conference Monday, Johnson said he spoke to Trump “multiple times” over the weekend, adding, “and of course, the filibuster came up.”
“I understand desperate times call for desperate measures. I also understand that traditionally, we’ve seen that as an important safeguard,” Johnson told reporters, referring to the filibuster, which effectively requires 60 votes in the 100-seat chamber to pass most legislation.
If Senate leadership decided to use the “nuclear option” to carveout an exception to the filibuster, the upper chamber would only need 50 votes to pass the GOP proposal to reopen the government.
Johnson made clear that “this is a Senate matter,” and that “my opinion is irrelevant.” But he expressed concern that Democrats, in the future, could “nuke” the filibuster to make it easier to pass parts of their agenda.
“I obviously shared my thoughts with the president on that,” the Speaker said. “As much as I have wanted to blow up the filibuster sometimes, as a House member, when we were not getting what we wanted done in our agenda, I hear my Senate Republican colleagues — some of the most conservative people in Congress — who say it’s an important safeguard. It prevents us, it holds us back from the Democrats’ worst impulses.”
“I mean, there’s a lot of abuses that could come and so that’s the caveat. That’s what they’re working through,” Johnson added.
Trump on Thursday urged Republicans to forgo the filibuster to reopen the government, which has been partially shut down since the beginning of October.
“It is now time for the Republicans to play their ‘TRUMP CARD,’ and go for what is called the Nuclear Option — Get rid of the Filibuster, and get rid of it, NOW!” Trump posted on Truth Social.
Senate GOP leaders have ruled out a potential change to the filibuster to reopen the government. Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters last month that getting rid of the filibuster in order to reopen government would be a “bad idea.”
Johnson said, based on his conversations with the president, it’s clear to him that Trump is “very passionate” about bypassing the filibuster.
“I speak frankly and honestly with the President, and he’s very passionate about this. We’re all very passionate. I think what you see in this debate we’re having on our own side is a reflection of the anger that we feel, the real desperation that we feel, because we want the government to be reopened,” he said.
“We want to serve the American people as best we can,” he continued. “And any hindrance to that is something that everybody’s looking at very carefully. Again, not a House issue, it’s a Senate issue, and we’ll see how that’s resolved.”