House leaders tell Senate to embrace the filibuster

House leaders tell Senate to embrace the filibuster
By Mike Soraghan
November 09, 2007

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said House leaders are pressing the Senate Democrats to force Republicans to stage more filibusters.

The idea, he said, is to give voters a clearer understanding that Democrats have been unable to enact more of their agenda.

“We have urged Harry Reid to pursue filibusters,” Hoyer told reporters Thursday at a breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor. “That is the only way you can give Americans a clear view of who is obstructing change.”

Hoyer’s request to Reid is the latest sign of the House leadership’s growing frustration with the Senate. Democratic House members generally confine their overt criticism for Senate Republicans. In this case, the House’s number-two Democrat made it public that he complained to Reid.

A common Washington quip, however, is that the best way for a House member to get a senator to do something is to urge publicly that a senator not to do it.

Reid aides declined comment. Don Stewart, spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said that holding filibusters is not going to get bills moving in the Senate. Stewart added it seems odd for Democrats to start talking tough six weeks after spending bills should have been finished for the new fiscal year.

“This is like not turning in your homework until the next semester, then claiming your dog ate it,” Stewart said.

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