Republicans and Democrats have been guilty of attempting to abolish the filibuster when they held power. The truth is, the filibuster is merely a Senate procedure to shut off debate that has existed since 1917.
The abolition of the filibuster is a bad idea that will destroy the Senate’s nature and make the government less responsive than it is today (if that is even possible).
The filibuster is a procedural, not a policy, matter. It extends the debate and allows all 100 members of the body to participate. Getting rid of the power of individual senators to engage in extended debate will make the Senate look more like the House, where all power resides in the speaker’s office.
The filibuster rule was memorialized in Rule 22 of the Senate’s Rules of Procedure. That rule allows 16 senators to sign a petition to shut off debate on a matter with “three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn,” or 60 senators voting in the affirmative to close debate. Opponents of legislation from both parties have used the tactic of threatening extended debate to slow or block its passage.
The right to filibuster nominations was attacked by Democrats in 2013. Then, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, falsely claimed that the filibuster of certain nominations was unconstitutional and used a simple majority to ignore the rules. The Senate’s written rules can only be changed after shutting down debate with a two-thirds’ majority, yet Reid used the so-called “Nuclear Option” to change the rules by violating them.