It took more than a year of Democratic outrage and organizing to reach this moment. And it took just a few minutes for a majority of senators to snuff it out
Late Wednesday night on the U.S. Senate floor, the moment that the Democratic Party faithful had been waiting for finally arrived: senators voted on changing the chamber’s rules to weaken the 60-vote threshold standing in the way of their marquee voting rights legislation.
It was not a dramatic outcome, despite the marathon of floor speeches from seemingly every member of the Senate on the historic, existential significance of the vote at hand. Even Vice President Kamala Harris, who had presided over an earlier procedural vote that also failed, had abandoned the doomed effort earlier that evening.
With roughly three dozen senators in the room and staff lined up down the walls of the chamber, Manchin often turned away from his lectern, speaking to his fellow Democrats directly. That served a fitting splitscreen for Democrats’ tortured and ultimately doomed campaign to muscle through a significant Senate rule change with the thinnest possible majority.
"Well, it all depends on whether or not we’re able to make the case to the American people that some of this is being set up to try to alter the outcome of the election," he said.
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