The president, speaking at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center, pushed for a nonpartisan
Biden’s speech comes as he is facing rising pressure from civil rights activists, progressives and some in party leadership to use new and aggressive tactics to combat Republican voting laws.
While Biden did not endorse a carve-out for the legislative filibuster — what activists and a growing number of Democrats are calling for, specifically for their signature voting rights bills — the president highlighted the expansion of the Justice Department’s Voting Rights Division and civil rights groups’ court challenges to protect voting rights.
He also pushed to enact the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, along with the For the People Act , H.R.1, which “would help end voter suppression in the states, get dark money out of politics, give voice to the people at the grassroots level, create fairer district maps and partisan political gerrymandering.”
“We’re facing the most significant test of our democracy since the Civil War,” Biden said. “Confederates, back then, never breached the Capitol as insurrectionists did on January the 6th. I’m not saying this to alarm you. I’m saying this because you should be alarmed.”
But Biden’s decision to omit the filibuster from his speech did not sit well with the racial and social justice coalition Just Democracy.
“President Biden’s speech missed the more critical point today: Until Congress eliminates the filibuster, voting rights remain under attack,” spokesperson Stephany Spaulding said. “President Biden laid out an important moral argument but fell short of the leadership the moment demands. He called for a coalition of advocates and organizers to stand up, but we’ve been standing up and leading the decades-long fight for voting rights.
"Black and Brown organizers didn’t turn out over 80 million voters to elect an organizer in chief. Now, it’s time for the president and the Senate to do their jobs — use the power of their offices to end the Jim Crow filibuster and change the law to protect voting rights.”
The president also looked back to the country’s history of voter suppression, including slavery denying full citizenship to Black Americans, Jim Crow poll taxes and literacy tests, and the women/s suffrage movement, while noting that the 2020 election was the most scrutinized in American history.
“Challenge after challenge brought to local state election officials, state legislatures, state and federal courts, even to the United States Supreme Court, not once but twice,” Biden said. “More than 80 judges, including those appointed by my predecessor, heard the arguments. In every case, neither cause nor evidence was found to undermine the national achievement of administering the historic election in the face of such extraordinary challenges. The Big Lie is just that: a big lie.”
Biden again called on Congress to pass Democrats’ sweeping bill to change the election system and another that would restore key provisions under the 1965 Voting Rights Act that were gutted by a 2013 Supreme Court decision.And he said the Supreme Court‘s weakening of the Voting Rights Act weeks ago put the burden back on Congress to restore it to its “intended strength.“
But Biden is severely limited , in part by the nature of the presidency but also because of the makeup of Congress, where Democrats have a slim House majority and control an evenly split Senate.
Those limitations, however, are driving Democrats to consider new tactics, including changing the legislative filibuster — which establishes a 60-vote threshold for most legislation to pass through the Senate and allows Republicans to block new voting rights legislation, among other Democratic priorities. And a growing number of Democratic legislators are looking to Biden to help make that happen.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), long an opponent of the filibuster, said he hopes to have a conversation with the White House concerning the procedural rule and that more of his Democratic colleagues in the Senate will change their mind about amending it.
“I'm sure that President Biden could be influential but he'll have to make that decision,” Blumenthal said of Biden pushing for a filibuster change.“I hope that he'll do everything possible.”
House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) told a news outlet the previous week that Biden “should endorse” a change to the filibuster and use his power to press Senate Democrats, like centrist Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who are resistant to such a change.
Biden could “pick up the phone and tell Joe Manchin, ‘Hey, we should do a carve-out.’” Clyburn said. “I don't care whether he does it in a microphone or on the telephone — just do it.”
Asked whether the voting rights bills could realistically reach Biden’s desk this year, Clyburn said, “I know it’s possible. The question is whether or not it's probable.”
“The way is clear, developing the will is what has to be done,” he said.
The White House rejected such an approach Monday when asked about Clyburn’s comments.
“[A] determination about making changes will be made by members of the Senate, not by this president or any president, frankly, moving forward,” Psaki told newsmen Monday when asked about changes to the filibuster.
But pressed on whether Biden sees any role for himself — akin to previous President Lyndon B. Johnson’s arm-twisting of reluctant Democrats during the battle to pass the Voting Rights Act — in the legislative process, the White House pointed to Biden’s rhetoric and current actions.
“If it were waving a magic wand to get voting rights legislation on his desk through any means, he would do that,” Psaki said, appearing to argue that Bden’s endorsement of a filibuster change wouldn’t change the math in the Senate. “But it requires the majority of members in the Senate to support changes to the filibuster.”
“What he can do as President is to continue to lift up, elevate, advocate, engage, [and] empower people across the country,” Psaki added. “That's the most instructive role he can play.”