Working majorities

This is Joseph

There has been a lot of discussion about the US senate and the filibuster.  For example, Jon Chait has a piece poking holes in Kyrsten Sinema's defense of the filibuster. Things got a bit derailed because it turns out that what Senator Sinema wants is massive filibuster reform, just one that restores it for things like judicial nominations. Now, clearly this viewpoint is a bit odd. Does anybody think that the party that confirmed three supreme justices with between 50 and 54 votes would be interested in returning to a 60 vote threshold? Note that five sitting justices have been appointed with under 60 votes, all them nominated by Republicans. But I don't think I cover new ground here.

Instead, what I want to point out is that the reason that Joe Manchin, Kysten Sinema, and Dianne Feinstein (all filibuster reform opponents) are so powerful is that the Democrats only have 50 senators. In these conditions any single senator can shatter the coalition. So you have an equilibrium where you have to keep 100% of the party to pass anything (or constantly get bipartisan support). What you really want is a working majority, which in the US senate is 52 or 53 seats -- you can lose one or two people and still pass your agenda. Further, if there are 3 or 4 holdouts, you only need to persuade one person to get to 50 votes. It dramatically changes the power structure. So the idea that one was going to have a successful push of tough legislation was always a bit fanciful.

The other core weakness is that I see a lot of focus on Joe Manchin, a 73 year old (i.e. old enough to retire, not old enough to have to) senator who won West Virginia in 2018. This is a state where the (losing) Republican candidate won by 69-30 (not a typo) in 2020 and 69-26 in 2016. Joe Manchin does not win elections due to his party and it is hard to imagine the leverage that you have to pressure him. You primary him and simply lose the seat (barring a miracle candidate). What he is doing led to him being elected in the toughest of conditions -- how do you persuade him that his approach is unsuccessful.

So I have two take-aways. One, the real issue is losing marginal races that were winnable. Look at Bill Nelson's loss to Rick Scott in Florida. Those close calls are the things that haunt you. Or the unforced error of having Dianne Feinstein as a California senator. She's blocking the filibuster as well, and there is little to no evidence that she is uniquely able to hold California. I never like to make predictions, but it seems unlikely that California is an easy Republican pick-up opportunity.

But the real issue here is that fragile majorities are just that - fragile. We should be realistic about what can be accomplished when every single Democrat senator has an individual veto.