Filibuster Reformers Coalesce Around Reid’s More Modest Reform Plan

SAHIL KAPUR JANUARY 16, 2013, 12:30 PM

The filibuster reform endgame is coming into focus.

Reformers are closing ranks behind a more modest proposal by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) that they believe could pass with a 51-vote threshold when the Senate returns next week and chip away at the minority party’s power to obstruct. It represents a concession that the full “talking filibuster” they want may not happen. But by accepting the emerging Reid proposal, reformers are warding off a competing plan that they consider even weaker than Reid’s.

Leaders of Fix The Senate Now, an outside pro-reform coalition, are accepting the modest approach, wary of seeing the whole effort collapse.

“We’re optimistic that some good changes are going to happen,” said Shane Larson, the legislative director for Communications Workers For America, whose group has already spent more than $300,000 on TV ads in the D.C. area pushing filibuster reform. “We’re very optimistic that we’re going to get there, that we’ll have 51 votes to put this through.”

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) says he’s still fighting for the talking filibuster and believes it can pass. His aide said he isn’t convinced the Reid plan would take on the core problems of the Senate, but Merkley didn’t rule it out.

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