How Dumb Does Kyrsten Sinema Think We Are?
This is a rational fear, but there are also good reasons to doubt it would be so simple. First, the Affordable Care Act is effectively a 12-year test case of this hypothesis. Republicans defined themselves in part over the last decade by their zeal to destroy Democrats landmark health care law. When they won a trifecta in 2017, they spent most of the first year in power trying to repeal the ACA. Even their so-called skinny repeal version failed to pass the Senate, with the GOPs handful of moderates torpedoing the bill in a dramatic late-night session. Republicans arent that enthusiastic about democracy these days, but GOP lawmakers arent exactly immune to electoral pressures yet, either. And what Sinema envisions would be an even greater leap than what the GOP sought to do in 2017. The programs she lists are so popular that Trump outmaneuvered his rivals in 2016 in part because he pledged not to cut Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid. And while he characteristically reneged on that promise in his budget proposals and during his 2020 campaign, Trump effectively demonstrated how little genuine appetite there is among rank-and-file conservatives to carry out the policy wishes of right-wing think tankers. Finally, as others quickly pointed out after Sinema published her op-ed, the filibuster doesnt actually protect any of these things. Senate rules allow lawmakers to bypass the filibuster through a process known as budget reconciliation, which allows for simple majority votes when the Senate considers certain budget and tax-related bills. Sinema should know this: Its how Democrats got the American Rescue Plan, Bidens $1.9 trillion stimulus package, through Congress in March. And if Republicans should get a trifecta in four years, they could always do exactly what she says without changing anything. Indeed, her point only underscores a deeper asymmetry between the two parties when it comes to the filibuster. For Democrats to achieve any of their policy prioritieson voting rights, on climate change, on health care, and morethey have to navigate a 60-vote gauntlet and the assent of 10 GOP senators. Republicans, on the other hand, can cut taxes, slash the federal budget, and stuff the courts with right-wing judges with a simple majority. Consider the ACA example from earlier: Democrats enacted it with a 60-vote Senate majority in 2010, and the GOP came close to gutting it in 2017 with a 50-vote majority through budget reconciliation.