Kyrsten Sinema’s Filibuster Stand: If Democrats Pass Bills, GOP Can Just Overturn Them Later

The Arizona Democrat argued in an op-ed that preserving the Senate minority rights is more important than passing legislation amid threats to democracy.

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema stood firmly for the filibuster Monday, saying essentially that Democrats should not take advantage of being in the majority by passing legislation that a future Republican majority could overturn. The Arizona Democrat wrote an opinion article that was published Monday in The Washington Post, the night before senators are set to vote on whether to debate sweeping voting rights legislation. No Republicans in the evenly divided Senate are expected to support the For the People Act, which would need at least 60 votes to overcome a filibuster. GOP lawmakers have already successfully used the filibuster this year to stop debate over one piece of legislation: establishing a bipartisan Jan. 6 commission. “It’s no secret that I oppose eliminating the Senate’s 60-vote threshold. I held the same view during three terms in the U.S. House, and said the same after I was elected to the Senate in 2018,” the moderate Democrat wrote. “If anyone expected me to reverse my position because my party now controls the Senate, they should know that my approach to legislating in Congress is the same whether in the minority or majority.”