Chump Manchin Feels Flim Flammed After Cornyn's Predictable Filibuster Flip Flop
Who could have seen this coming other than everyone?
Republican Sen. John Cornyn is fighting for his political life. There’s a good chance he’ll lose the upcoming Texas Senate runoff to perpetual corruption machine Ken Paxton. Cornyn had a somewhat well-earned image as an almost respectable Republican (after the 2022 Uvalde school shooting, he helped pass a bipartisan gun safety package). However, he’s now so desperate to keep his job that he’s actively shredding that image.
It wasn’t enough that Cornyn proved a reliable vote for Donald Trump’s most incompetent, wholly unfit nominees, such as Pete Hegseth, Kristi Noem, Kash Patel, Tulsi Gabbard, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Now, he’s reversed his previous support for the Senate filibuster so that Republicans can pass the voter suppression, anti-trans bill known as the SAVE act.
“After careful consideration, I support whatever changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary for us to get the SAVE America Act and homeland security funding past the Democrats’ obstruction, through the Senate, and on the president’s desk for his signature,” Cornyn wrote in an op-ed for the New York Post.
Of course, this was entirely predictable. Republicans like Cornyn treated the filibuster as a useful tool for blocking popular Democratic legislation. On the rare occasions they want to actually pass something, they see no reason to use that tool against themselves. No one would ever willingly bash their own face in with a hammer. Well, maybe Cornyn’s former Senate buddy Joe Manchin might. He adored the filibuster. He idolized it all out of proportion ... no, make that: He romanticized it all out of proportion. (Cue the Gershwin music.)
Manchin swiftly responded to Cornyn’s opportunistic about face in a rambling social media post, only some of which I’ll bore you with here:
When I was a U.S. Senator, there was not another person more committed to keeping the filibuster than Senator John Cornyn. He understood the incredible political pressure I faced from my former party to get rid of the filibuster and give Democrats complete power — and at the time, he understood why neither party should take our country past this point of no return.
The filibuster — the soul of the Senate — has preserved the Senate’s role for nearly 250 years as the institution that cools passions, protects minority voices, and demands consensus. America was built on institutions designed to resist political convenience, not surrender to it.
The filibuster is hardly the “soul of the Senate.” It’s not a legislative James Brown. The strategy of “talking a bill to death” was common enough by the mid-19th Century to gain the colorful sobriquet “filibuster.” However, it was almost always a tool of obstruction. Manchin claims the filibuster “protects minority voices,” which is absurd as segregationists filibustered civil rights legislation and most recently the filibuster blocked any bill that would’ve protected “minority voices” from GOP attempts to suppress their vote. Of course, whenever Manchin talks about protecting minority voices, he almost exclusively means white voters in states with more land than people. The Senate is already a DEI program for white, rural Americans. A senator from California represents 40 million people. A senator from West Virginia represents 1.7 million people (barely more than the population on San Diego). They both have one vote.
Manchin said the “60-vote threshold is essential to maintain the longevity we need in our bills,” which is ahistorical nonsense. The 60-vote threshold didn’t exist until 1975. It’s barely older than Taxi Driver. Previously, it required 67 votes to break a filibuster, and a senator couldn’t just invoke it. They had to stand on the Senate floor for days, and contrary to Manchin’s delusions, the filibuster didn’t promote bipartisan cooperation, it paralyzed the Senate.
When Republicans are in the majority, they make little effort to work across the aisle, and when they’re in the minority, they reflexively oppose and obstruct any Democratic legislation. This arrangement seems to suit Manchin just fine, and as I observed in 2024, I think that’s because he fundamentally believes the country works better when white men call the shots. He’s slightly more polite about it than the average MAGA loon but ultimately, in word and deed, he supports and advances policies that preserve the power of a shrinking white majority. Ironically, Cornyn is the consistent one. He’s abandoned the filibuster because it no longer serves this purpose, while Manchin is clinging to his precious filibuster like he’s Gollum.
Manchin is so committed to the filibuster he couldn’t bring himself to endorse Kamala Harris, the non-fascist, not-senile candidate, because she supported reforming what Barack Obama correctly called a “Jim Crow relic.” We had more serious issues to worry about in 2024, but Manchin still found the time to wag his finger at Harris: “Shame on her!” Manchin said. “She knows the filibuster is the Holy Grail of democracy. It’s the only thing that keeps us talking and working together. If she gets rid of that, then this would be the House on steroids.”
The “Holy Grail of Democracy” is the simple concept of “one person, one vote.” The filibuster is more like the pimped-out, jewel-encrusted, obviously fake Holy Grail that kills you within seconds of drinking from it.
Manchin wrote last week, “It’s deeply disappointing to see that Senator Cornyn is now willing to scrap the very rule he once praised and personally thanked me for defending. These extreme election-year politics that put party power over everything else are why Americans are sick and tired of the duopoly of the two-party system of Democrats and Republicans.”
Manchin argues that Cornyn is putting “party power over everything else,” but Cornyn is clear that he believes the SAVE act is more important than a Senate rule. Republicans supported the filibuster because it preserved their party’s power! That was the whole point. Manchin claims that Cornyn begged him to maintain the filibuster, all while Republicans used it to block voting and abortion rights legislation.
“He said, ‘Joe … you get rid of this filibuster and I guarantee you it’ll ruin the Senate. It’ll ruin the way we do business here,” Manchin recalled. Maybe he was stupid enough to believe Cornyn’s plaintive appeal. Or maybe Manchin was content with the donor cash that rolled in for as long as he and Krysten Sinema ensured Joe Biden’s Democratic trifecta moved like a tricycle.
Meanwhile, Cornyn is making the case that Manchin and Sinema should have if they cared about their constituents. Republicans control the presidency, the Senate, and the House of Representatives. The SAVE act is terrible, but if they have majority support to pass it, they should do so. That’s how democracy works.
I’ve seen it argued that Manchin’s long-winded tirade will help Democrats somehow, but I fear this ignores the fact that the filibuster is unpopular. Normal people prefer straightforward democracy to antiquated Senate rules. They don’t care about Senate comity. They’d prefer if the Senate actually does something. A 2024 poll showed that three out out four Americans believed eliminating the filibuster would have a positive impact.
Hypocrisy is hardly disqualifying in modern politics (to the extent it ever was). Voters find pious sanctimony less forgivable, which is why both Manchin and Sinema are former senators. Cornyn is in no hurry to join them.