During a new Fox interview, former President Donald Trump praised the refusal by Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) to support major changes to the Senate’s filibuster rules, which currently require the agreement of 60 Senators in the 100-member chamber before moving forward on most legislation. Thus, there is — generally speaking — a requirement for agreement from at least some members of the Senate’s minority party prior to holding a final vote on many bills, and this procedural requirement grants Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) a form of veto power.
When in office as president, Trump ardently opposed the Senate’s filibuster rules, since at the time, Democrats were the ones in the minority with the power to block the movement of certain legislation. Now, he’s changed his position. Asked about Manchin’s support for the filibuster, Trump told Fox host Stuart Varney as follows:
‘It’s a very important thing. He’s doing the right thing, and it’s a very important thing. Otherwise, you’re gonna be packing the court; you’re gonna be doing all sorts of very, very bad things that were unthinkable and were never even brought up during the election. Nobody brought this stuff up. Bernie Sanders can’t believe it. This is so radical liberal, radical left — Bernie Sanders can’t believe it. This is far more than he ever even talked about… The most radical left people can not believe what’s happening.’
There’s no actual indication that Bernie Sanders “can’t believe it.” Trump appears to just be pulling things out of thin air. Hear his remarks below:
Manchin has characterized his support for the filibuster as a push for bipartisanship, but most Republicans in Congress have consistently proven that they’re not exactly interested in meaningfully engaging across party lines. Across both the Senate and House, 147 Republicans voted in favor of throwing out key parts of Biden’s election victory altogether when the results came up for Congressional certification, which doesn’t suggest ambitions towards bipartisanship.
Meanwhile, Trump has continued to promote the lie that the 2020 presidential race was somehow rigged for Biden, and recently, reporting emerged indicating that he believes he will be reinstated as president by August of this year. Thus, a former president of the United States is apparently harboring a fantasy of the overthrow of the current U.S. government, and with Trump as a current central leader of the GOP, that’s not exactly a formula for bipartisan cooperation!
Trump has been telling a number of people he’s in contact with that he expects he will get reinstated by August (no that isn’t how it works but simply sharing the information). https://t.co/kaXSXKnpF0
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) June 1, 2021
