Ahead of the first anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, Sen. Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts) said it's imperative that Democrats pass pending voting rights legislation to safeguard the American political system for the future.
"We can stand up and turn back this anti-democratic movement if the Senate takes action to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the Freedom to Vote Act," Markey said on Wednesday. "And if necessary, we have to abolish the filibuster in order to accomplish that goal."
Since President Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election, and the attack on the Capitol failed to overturn that result, many Republican-controlled states have created new laws that make it harder to vote with provisions including stricter voter ID requirements and shorter deadlines to apply for mail-in ballots — as well as laws that limit the power of state and local election officials and could lead to future elections being overturned.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer signaled this week that he'll push for a temporary suspension of the filibuster by mid-January to pass legislation aimed at protecting voting rights. Such a move would require the support of Sens. Joe Manchin (D-West Virginia) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Arizona), who have consistently opposed any rules change that would let Democrats create laws with a simple majority.
On Wednesday, though, Markey said he still believes Manchin and Sinema can be convinced to accept Schumer's proposal.
"Senator Manchin says that he is open to further discussion about this issue," Markey said. "So we have to take him at face value — and along with Senator Sinema, continue this conversation about the need to modify the filibuster in order to protect voting rights.
"Joe Manchin wants to pass voting rights legislation — he supports it," Markey added. "The final obstacle is just modifying the filibuster so that we don't need 60 votes, because we know that Senate Republicans have drawn a red line and are not going to cross it. We will receive no Republican votes for voting rights protections. It's a sad commentary on the modern Republican Party, but that's just where they are."
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who last fall supported a compromise version of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, is a possible exception to Markey's characterization.
Asked if any new voting rights laws would promptly be eliminated if Republicans retake control of both the Senate and House, Markey replied that the laws themselves would make that result less likely.
"The Republican plan is to take over the House and Senate — and the way they want to effectuate that result is the suppression of Black and brown voters in the United States," Markey said. "If we can pass national legislation to protect Black and brown voters, it reduces substantially the likelihood that the Democrats lose either the House or the Senate to Republicans in 2022."
While the Biden administration has been criticized for not acting with sufficient urgency in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack, Markey said the president is treating ongoing threats to the political system with appropriate seriousness. As an example, the senator cited Biden's support for circumventing the filibuster to shore up voting rights.
Despite Markey's optimism about the passage of new legislation, he struck a pessimistic note about the state of American politics in 2022.
"One year later, Donald Trump's big lie [that he, not Biden, won the 2020 election] has turned into an even bigger threat to democracy," Markey said.
"The mob was fueled not only by Donald Trump's big lie, but by the global rise of authoritarian and nationalist movements that reject the basic principles of American democracy: equality, freedom, and the peaceful transfer of power," Markey added. "And we saw that last January 6. And that's what we're still fighting today."
