On Saturday, November 8th, President Trump publicly urged the U.S. Senate to directly distribute healthcare funds to the people, bypassing health insurance companies.
Due to disagreements on healthcare issues, the Senate has been unable to pass a short-term spending bill. The U.S. government was forced to shut down on October 1st, and it continues to this day, breaking the record of President Trump’s first term government shutdown of 35 days. Currently, there are still no signs of easing tensions between the two parties.
The President wrote on the social media platform Truth Social, “I suggest to Senate Republicans to take the billions of dollars currently allocated to those money-grubbing health insurance companies trying to sustain the terrible Obamacare healthcare system and directly distribute it to the people, allowing them to afford to purchase higher quality health insurance of their choice, with some surplus left over.”
He added, “In other words, take money away from those large, terrible insurance companies, give it to the people, and completely put an end to Obamacare, the worst healthcare system in the world. Additionally, we must abolish the filibuster process!”
The “filibuster” is a Senate rule that allows senators to delay or prevent a vote on a bill by speaking or remaining silent indefinitely. It is a strategy to obstruct the passage of a bill by utilizing the right to debate.
In this government shutdown situation, Democratic senators used the filibuster strategy to stall the vote, putting pressure on Republicans to agree to modify the funding bill to extend subsidies for Obamacare.
To end the filibuster, the Senate must pass a procedure known as “cloture”. Cloture requires the support of 60 senators (there are a total of 100 senators in the Senate). Therefore, the filibuster strategy essentially raises the threshold from a simple majority to 60 votes to pass a bill.
In situations where consensus cannot be reached, one way to end the filibuster is by using another legislative procedure in the Senate known as the “nuclear option”.
According to documents from the Library of Congress, in the past in 2013 and 2017, the majority party in the Senate, whether Democrat or Republican, has utilized the “nuclear option”, an unusual and controversial parliamentary rule, to limit or prevent the minority from obstructing business with a filibuster. Under the “nuclear option” procedure, a senator can move to end the filibuster and then proceed to a vote. If a simple majority (51 votes) is achieved, the filibuster can be stopped.