Today's Vote On Nuclear Option Only Confirms Reality Since 2005
While we wait for the Republicans in the Senate to officially demolish yet another democratic norm in a raw pursuit of power, it is worth noting that this is a culmination of decades of GOP destruction of our democratic processes.
While the press and Republicans like to focus on Harry Reid’s decision to eliminate the filibuster for lower court justices and executive branch appointees, that not only ignores the total obstruction by Senate Republicans and the refusal to even provide a hearing for Merrick Garland but also is a misreading of the actual history that has led us to where we are today.
In reality, the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees was eliminated by Mitch McConnell way back in 2005. Not many people remember it now, but, as Josh Marshall points out, Republicans threatened to invoke the nuclear option if Democrats blocked the confirmation of both Justice Roberts and Justice Alito. That threat led to the so-called “Gang of 14” agreement that said that Democrats would not use the filibuster except in “extraordinary circumstances” in return for the Republicans abandoning their threat to use the nuclear option. Under that agreement, both Roberts and Alito were confirmed, with Roberts gaining more than 60 votes and Alito less. Alito’s confirmation with only 58 votes effectively ended the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees because the threat of the nuclear option had succeeded. The Democrats agreement to not use the filibuster in order to avoid the nuclear option was essentially agreeing to eliminate the filibuster because, as we have seen today, the use of the filibuster by Democrats would provoke Republicans to use the nuclear option.
Today’s vote only makes official what has been the actual reality since 2005. If the treatment of Merrick Garland did not create an “extraordinary circumstance”, then nothing will. The Republicans were always going to be willing to use the nuclear option and Democrats were only kidding themselves that preserving the filibuster option was accomplishing anything. Today, Republicans will have to vote to once again destroy a democratic norm that has served the country well for generations. Not only will history treat them unkindly for this raw power grab, there will come a day in the near future when Republicans will long for the ability to use the filibuster. They will have dug their own graves.