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In a Senate procedural vote on whether to start debate on Senator Joe Manchin’s compromise For the People Act, which would add a nationwide voter ID requirement or other alternative like providing a utility bill receipt to prove identity; make Election Day a public holiday; along with an outline of about 24 other proposals that incorporate some of the original bill, including tighter campaign finance and ethics rules. The For the People Act ended as expected in a 50-50 vote along party lines. Sixty votes had been required to overcome Republicans’ use of the filibuster.  

The most viable option for passing the Act is to remove the filibuster rule by invoking the so-called nuclear option which would then require only a simple majority vote in the Senate to pass legislation. However, the filibuster need not be eliminated entirely but could instead be lowered from 60 to a lower number or changed. For example, in 2013 Democrats removed the 60-vote threshold and moved to majority votes for most federal court nominees, except to the Supreme Court. In 2017, Republicans used the nuclear option for Supreme Court nominees as well.  

Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), however, are opposed to ending the filibuster to enact federal voting rights legislation. It is unclear whether they would vote to even change the filibuster rule. Meanwhile, 14 states have enacted 22 laws to make it harder to vote and other Republican-controlled states are considering similar legislation.  

On June 25, 2021, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the state of Georgia over their recently-passed restrictive voting law. Hopefully this is just one of many such lawsuits. 

Senate Republicans’ refusal to even debate the Act and their previous refusal to vote for an independent commission on the January 6 Capitol riot should be enough evidence for Senate Democrats that bipartisanship is not possible with their Republican colleagues. Why, because Democrats try to govern through policy, while Republicans focus their energy on ideological interests and growing and preserving their political power.  

In a bit of satire, Andy Borowitz put it nicely: "Blasting the For the People Act, Senator Mitch McConnell claimed that the bill’s passage would bring the United States to the brink of democracy. The Democrats can dress this bill up any way they want, but their real agenda couldn’t be clearer, the Senate Minority Leader said. They want to turn the United States of America that we love and cherish into a democracy. Noting that the word 'democracy' originated in ancient Greece, he vowed, I will not sit idly by and watch a foreign form of government sneak across our border. McConnell rallied his fellow Republican senators by reminding them that we’re the only thing standing between this country and democracy. The people who voted for us did not vote for us so that other people could vote for other people,” he said.” Sometimes, as here, using exaggeration and hyperbole to get to a truth that the real news often cannot. 

Unless the For the People Act is passed, these state voter suppression laws could cost the Democrat’s majorities in both the House and Senate in the midterm elections. If the Democrats lose a majority in either body, nothing will pass in Congress the last two years of Joe Biden’s presidency, opening the door for the unthinkable — the return of Donald Trump to the White House.