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Join John OConnor for fearless conservative political commentary and investigative analysis on OConnors Right Stand. Each week, get unfiltered perspectives on current events, government accountability, and judicial failures that mainstream media wont cover. Hard-hitting episodes featuring in-depth political analysis, breaking news commentary, and the conservative viewpoints you need to hear.
00:00
Good Tuesday morning, Patriots. Welcome back to O'Connor's Right Stand. I'm your host, John O'Connor, software programmer by day, conservative truth seeker by night. We are now on day 35 of the government shutdown, 35 days. We have officially tied the record for the longest government shutdown in American history, matching the 35-day shutdown from Trump's first term back in 2018 into 2019.
00:28
And here's what's happening right now as I record this. Over 42 million Americans didn't get their SNAP benefits this past weekend. Food banks across the country are overwhelmed. Air traffic controllers are working without pay. And Senate Democrats, led by good old Chuckie, continue to hold the entire country hostage because they're demanding healthcare subsidies that, let's be honest, end up covering illegal aliens. But...
00:54
Here's what happened last week that has Washington absolutely losing their mind. President Trump called on Senate Republicans to use the nuclear option to eliminate the filibuster and reopen the government. And patriots? The response from both sides has been fascinating. Republicans said no. Democrats suddenly remembered why they loved the filibuster after spending years trying to kill it. This got me thinking.
01:23
What do I really know about the filibuster? So, after a bunch of studying over the weekend, and a lot of note taking and thinking, today we're going to deep dive into the filibuster. What is it? Where did it come from? How did we get here? What's the hypocrisy on both sides? And most importantly, what should Republicans actually do? The right stand starts now.
02:04
All right, first things first, what the heck is a filibuster? Here's the simple version. In the Senate, it takes 60 votes to end debate on most legislation, not to pass it, to end debate on it. Once you end debate with 60 votes, then you can actually vote on a passage, which only needs 51 votes. This 60 vote requirement is called invoking cloture.
02:32
And when you can't get 60 votes to end debate, that's called a filibuster. Now, here's what most people picture when they hear filibuster. They think of that Jimmy Stewart movie, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, where a senator stands on the floor talking for 24 hours straight to block a corrupt bill. Or they think of Strom Thurmond in 1957 talking for 24 hours and 18 minutes trying to block the Civil Rights Act.
03:02
By the way, Cory Booker broke that record in April of this year speaking for over 25 hours against Trump administration policies. But here's the dirty little secret. We don't do that kind of filibuster anymore. Since the early 1970s, we have what's called a silent filibuster. A senator doesn't have to actually stand there and talk. They just have to say, they're going to filibuster and boom.
03:31
You need 60 votes to move forward. No 24-hour speeches, no standing until you collapse, just a threat, and the bill dies unless you have 60 votes. That's what's happening right now with this shutdown. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has a bill that would fund the government through November 21st. The House passed it. Republicans have 53 Senate votes for it. But Chuck Schumer...
03:58
and Senate Democrats won't give them the 7 votes they need to hit 60. So the government stays shut down. Now Trump is saying screw the filibuster, change the rules, pass it with 51 votes, go nuclear. And to understand why this is such a big deal, we need to understand where this rule even came from. Here's something that's going to blow your mind, patriots. The filibuster was created by accident.
04:29
The founding fathers never intended for the Senate to have a filibuster. It's not in the Constitution. It's not some sacred tradition from 1787. It was a bureaucratic screw-up that turned into 200 plus years of Senate tradition. Here's what happened. Both the House and the Senate originally had something called the Previous Question Motion. This was a rule that let a simple majority, just 51%,
04:57
end debate and move to a vote. The House still has this rule today, but the Senate, they got rid of it in 1806. Why? Because Aaron Burr, yes, the guy who shot Alexander Hamilton, told the Senate their rule book was redundant and overly complicated. He suggested they clean it up. So, the Senate dropped the previous question motion, thinking they didn't need it. And for about 30 years,
05:27
nothing happened. Senators just agreed to end debates and move to votes. But by the 1830s and 1840s, Senators figured out what they'd accidentally done. Without a rule to force a vote, they could just keep talking. And talking. And talking. And if they could keep talking long enough, they could kill a bill without ever voting on it. The word filibuster
05:56
comes from a Dutch word meaning pirate because it's essentially hijacking the legislative process. And by the 1860s, the tactic had a name and was being used regularly. For 110 years, there was no way to stop a filibuster. If a senator wanted to talk forever, they could. The only way to end it was for the senator to literally give up or for the majority to give in to their demands.
06:26
This all came to a head in 1917, during World War I. Here's the story. President Woodrow Wilson wanted to arm American merchant ships to protect them from German U-boats. But a group of 11 senators, led by Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin, filibustered the bill. They opposed US entry into the war and they talked and talked until the Senate session ended without a vote. Wilson was furious.
06:55
He went to the press and said, this is a direct quote, A little group of willful men, representing no opinion but their own, have rendered the great government of the United States helpless and contemptible. The public went nuts. People were burning senators and effigy in the streets. Wilson demanded the Senate create a rule to stop filibusters. And so, on March 8, 1917, the Senate passed Rule 22, the cloture rule. Originally,
07:24
You needed two-thirds of the Senate, 67 votes, to invoke cloture and end debate. But even with that rule, cloture was almost never used. Between 1917 and 1964, cloture was only successfully invoked five times. And you know what those filibusters were mostly used for? Blocking civil rights legislation, anti-lynching bills in 1922 and 1935,
07:52
The Civil Rights Act of 1957, voting rights legislation. Southern Democrats used the filibuster again and again to block progress on civil rights. In 1975, the Senate changed the rule from 67 votes down to 60. And then in the 1970s, they made another change, the one I mentioned earlier, where you don't actually have to hold the floor and talk. You just threaten to filibuster
08:22
and the burden is on the majority to find 60 votes. Since then, the use of the filibuster has exploded. There have been more than 2,500 votes to invoke cloture since 1917. More than half of those have been just in the last 12 years. The filibuster has gone from a rarely used emergency break to standard operating procedure in Washington. Now,
08:48
Both parties have chipped away at the filibuster over the years, but Democrats started the nuclear option trend and Republicans followed. In 2013, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democrats eliminated the filibuster for the most executive branch nominees and federal judges below the Supreme Court level. Why? Because they were frustrated that Republicans were blocking Obama's nominees. Reid went nuclear with a simple majority vote. At the time,
09:18
Mitch McConnell warned them, you'll regret this. And guess what? Four years later, when Republicans had the majority and Trump was president, McConnell extended Reid's rule change to include Supreme Court nominees. That's how we got Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett of the court without needing 60 votes. Then, in September of this year, John Thune used the nuclear option again.
09:44
This time to confirm 48 of Trump nominees in a single vote, bypassing the normal process. Democrats cried foul, but Dune was just using the playbook Democrats created. But here's where the hypocrisy gets absolutely rich, patriots. Remember when Biden was in office and Democrats controlled the Senate? They wanted to kill the filibuster for legislation. Not just nominees, actual laws. They wanted to eliminate
10:13
it to pass nationwide abortion protections, voting rights legislation, and the Green New Deal. Kamala Harris, when she was running for president, said she supported eliminating the filibuster to pass abortion laws nationwide. Senators like Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, and others were screaming that the filibuster was a Jim Crow relic that had to go. The only Democrats who stopped them were Joe Manchin and Kristen Sinema.
10:41
who refused to support killing the legislative filibuster. And now? Now that Republicans have the majority, suddenly Democrats love the filibuster. It's essential to democracy. It's a crucial check on power. It protects minority rights. Senator John Federman from Pennsylvania actually called out his own party on this. He said, I quote, we ran on killing the filibuster and now we love it. I don't want to hear any Democrat
11:10
clutching their pearls about the filibuster. At least Federman's honest about the hypocrisy. And get this, Federman actually said he'd support Republicans using the nuclear option to end the shutdown. He said his constituents need to eat and that SNAP benefits are too important. So last week, Trump came back from his Asia trip and issued his call to action on Truth Social. He wrote, it is now time for the Republicans to play their Trump card.
11:39
and go for what is called the nuclear option. Get rid of the filibuster and get rid of it now." He continued on Saturday, saying, "'Terminate the filibuster, not just for the shutdown, but for everything else. We will get all of our common sense policies approved, voter ID anyone, and make America great again. Remember, the Democrats will do it immediately, as soon as they get the chance. Our doing it will not give them that chance.'"
12:08
Trump's argument is straightforward. Democrats wanted to do this when they had the power. They only failed because Manchin and Sinema stopped them. But the next time Democrats had the White House and 51 Senate votes, they will kill the filibuster. So Republicans should do it now while they have the chance. And you know what? He's probably right about Democratic intentions. But Senate Republicans said no. Immediately. Firmly.
12:37
John Thune's spokesman said his position on the filibuster is unchanged. Senator John Curtis from Utah tweeted, the filibuster forces us to find common ground in the Senate. Power changes hands, but principles shouldn't. Senator Tom Tillis from North Carolina even said he would resign if Republicans voted to eliminate the filibuster. Mike Johnson, the House Speaker, called it a very important safeguard and said Trump's comments were,
13:05
An expression of the president's anger at the situation. Some House Republicans backed Trump. Congressman Byron Donalds from Florida wrote a letter to Thune calling for the nuclear option. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Annapolina Luna supported it. Mark Levin suggested Republicans should consider either suspending or eliminating the filibuster for routine budget bills. But Senate Republicans, the ones who would actually have to vote for it, are holding the line.
13:35
So, patriots, here's the million dollar question. What should Republicans actually do? Let me be clear about something. I understand Trump's frustration. I get it. We have 53 Senate seats. We have the House. We have the White House. We should be able to reopen the government and fund it through November 21st. But Chuck Schumer and the Senate Democrats are holding 42 million Americans food assistance hostage
14:02
because they want to extend Obamacare subsidies that prop up illegal alien healthcare. It's infuriating. It's un-American. And I completely understand why Trump wants to blow up the filibuster to end this. But, and this is important, I think Senate Republicans are making the right call by not going nuclear. Here's why. First, think about what happens when Democrats inevitably take back the Senate. And they will, eventually.
14:31
That's how our system works. If we eliminate the filibuster now, Democrats will have zero obstacles when they are back in power. DC statehood, done. Puerto Rico statehood, done. Backpacking the Supreme Court with six more justices, done. The Green New Deal, done. Nationwide gun confiscation, done. Abolishing the Electoral College, they try. Everything conservatives have fought.
15:00
could be wiped out in a single two-year session of Congress with 51 votes. Second, Republicans have another tool available, budget reconciliation. This is a process that already allows certain budget-related bills to pass with just 51 votes. Republicans used it to pass Trump's tax cuts in his first term. It has limitations, but it's there. Third, and I think this is the most important point,
15:31
Republicans should demand a return to the talking filibuster. Remember, the current system is a silent filibuster. A senator just has to threaten it and boom, you need 60 votes. But what if we changed the rule back to how it used to work? What if we said, you want a filibuster? Fine, but you have to actually hold the floor. You have to stand there and talk for as long as you can.
16:00
No breaks, no sitting down, keep talking or the bill moves forward. This would change everything because right now Chuck Schumer and Senate Democrats can block the government from reopening without any political cost. They don't have to do anything. But imagine if we changed the rules so that Schumer himself had to stand on the Senate floor for 24, 48, 72 hours.
16:26
explaining to the American people why he's blocking food assistance for 42 million Americans so that illegal aliens can keep getting subsidized healthcare. Do you think he'd do it? Do you think he'd stand there on C-SPAN for three days straight while American families can't feed their kids, while air traffic controllers work without pay, while federal employees go without paychecks, all because he wants to extend Obamacare subsidies? I don't think so.
16:57
And if he did try it, the political cost would be enormous. Americans would see exactly who's responsible for the shutdown. The talking filibuster would restore accountability. It would make obstruction visible instead of invisible. It would force senators to actually defend their positions publicly instead of hiding behind procedural threats. Look, patriots, the filibuster is complicated.
17:25
It's not in the Constitution. It was created by accident. It's been used to block both terrible things and good things throughout our history. It's been abused by both parties. But I think it serves an important purpose. It forces the majority party to work with the minority. It prevents wild swings in policy every time control of Washington changes hands. It's messy and frustrating, but it's part of what makes the Senate different from the House.
17:55
It's supposed to be the cooling saucer, not the boiling pot. Trump is right that Democrats are hypocrites. He's right that they'll probably try to kill the filibuster the next time they have power. But two wrongs don't make a right. Republicans shouldn't abandon a principle just because Democrats might abandon it later. Instead, Republicans should, one, keep using reconciliation where possible, two,
18:23
Reform the filibuster to require actual talking, bringing back accountability. Three, keep the pressure on Democrats to explain why they're holding the country hostage. And four, force the vote after vote after vote, making Democrats defend their obstruction. And here's my prediction. The shutdown will end this week, whether it's through negotiations or through Democrats finally cracking under the political pressure. This will end.
18:53
And when it does, the filibuster will still be intact. But the fight over the filibuster, I think that fight is just getting started. That's it for today, Patriots. Thanks for tuning in to O'Connor's Right Stand. Remember, we're holding the line unapologetically. If you want to support the show, head over to O'Connor'sRightStand.com and make sure you're following me on X at O'Connor podcasts for updates throughout the week. We'll talk again soon. Stay strong out there. This is John O'Connor.
19:23
Signing off and I'll see you on Thursday.