Hevvy Kevvy

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

The Hitchhiker’s Guide To What To Expect On DHS Funding When The Senate Meets Monday The DHS funding drama heads back to the Senate Monday morning after the House approved a two-month stopgap spending plan for all of DHS late Friday night. The Senate meets Monday at 10:30 am et in what was supposed to be a brief “pro forma” session where the body simply gavels in and gavels out with a skeleton crew on hand. But that might not be what happens Monday. As soon as the Senate gets through the prayer a pledge, it’s likely a Republican senator seeks recognition from the chair. If that happens, we anticipate the GOP senator to ask unanimous consent (meaning all 100 senators would agree) to take up the DHS bill passed by the House Friday, that it be “read a third time” and passed. The chair will then ask if there is an objection. If any senator - be they a Democrat or Republican - objects, the House bill is dead. That means that the House and Senate continue to be out of alignment on the DHS funding question. For instance, the House didn’t even consider the bill cleared by all 100 senators and passed by the Senate at 2:19 am Friday. The House simply wrote their own two-month interim bill, passed it Friday night and skipped town. If there is no objection, the House and Senate are aligned and will have passed the same bill. That means they are on the same page. Approval of the House bill by the Senate would end the DHS shutdown. But if there’s an objection, everything remains frozen. This is both the parliamentary magic - and dark underbelly of “unanimous consent” in the Senate. You could have 99 senators in favor of something. But all it takes is a solitary objection to foil a bill under “unanimous consent” or “UC” as it’s often called in the Senate. In fact, it’s possible that Democrats could then offer their own DHS funding bill and ask the Senate to approve that by unanimous consent. It’s likely that whatever Republican senator is on duty tomorrow would object, thus blocking the Democratic request. If the Senate blocks the House bill, it’s doubtful there’s any way to end the DHS shutdown until after both bodies return in mid-April after the Easter/Passover recess. Republicans truly want to fund DHS. But a Democratic objection presents the GOP with a political opportunity. They can then point to that objection as the reason DHS remains shuttered, arguing that Democrats blocked the House approved bill. Republicans believe this helps them in the midterms. They ran on border security and won in 2024. Republicans want to point to a Democratic objection as evidence that they don’t want to fund ICE. But by the same token, Democrats could argue that Republicans are partly responsible for the shutdown and the long TSA lines if they object to the Democratic unanimous consent request. And so it goes.

How did we get to be $39 trillion in debt? The zombie filibuster—coupled with a chronic unwillingness among senators to break through it by putting in the hard work—has contributed to it substantially. For decades, this dynamic has been giving Senate Democrats way too much power when it comes to spending bills—even when they’re in the minority. Spending bills in the Senate routinely get to 60 votes—regardless of who’s in the majority and who controls the House and the White House—with votes coming from (1) basically every Senate Democrat and (2) a much smaller group of Republicans (predominantly members of the Appropriations Committee), in many cases just a few more than whatever it takes to achieve cloture. As a result, disagreements on spending bills tend to be resolved by simply spending more—to give those voting for it what they need to vote for it. This is one of many reasons why I’ve been pushing so hard on the talking filibuster which, if fully utilized and given the time it needs to work, could help us pass the SAVE America Act. But the benefits wouldn’t end there, as they could help us avoid not only the kind of shutdown hell we’re now experiencing, but also rein in our debt and deficit—at least while Republicans are in charge. Share if you’d like to see the Senate use the talking filibuster—to fully fund DHS, to pass the SAVE America Act, to reduce spending, and otherwise!

John Thune has destroyed every single Senate norm that he claimed to cherish. He set a far bigger and more dangerous precedent than abolishing the filibuster.