Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) on Thursday excoriated Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-KY) filibuster talkathon the previous day both for its substance and the fear that the spectacle could embolden the cause of reforming the filibuster.
“What we saw yesterday is going to give ammunition to those critics who say that the rules of the Senate are being abused,” he said on the floor. “I hope that my colleagues on this side of the aisle will take that in information.”
McCain co-authored a scaled-back rules change that preserved the filibuster and became the basis for the bipartisan deal, defeating a more far-reaching reform proposal.
“We were able to put a side of the there was another effort just at the beginning of this Senate to do away with 60 votes and [go] back down to 51, which in my view would have destroyed the Senate,” he said Thursday. ‘A group of us worked very hard for a long time to come up with some compromises that would allow the Senate to move more rapidly … and efficiently, but at the same time preserve a 60-vote majority requirement on some pieces of legislation.”
