Coalition of Far-Left Groups Sends Letter to Schumer Urging ‘Eliminate the Filibuster’

WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 03: Senate Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) listens during
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Over 100 far-left organizations signed a letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) saying the filibuster “needs to be eliminated” in the wake of Republican senators successfully blocking the legislation to create a commission to probe the events of January 6.

“We have moved past hypotheticals and entered a perilous new moment for our democracy,” the group wrote. “Senate Republicans’ decision to block legislation establishing a bipartisan commission to investigate the January 6th insurrection is a shameful abdication of their duties to our country.”

The coalition of far-left groups, among them The People for the American Way and the Working Families Party, also directly quoted Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), saying, “So disheartening. It makes you really concerned about our country.” Manchin has said he is not willing to change his stance on the filibuster.

The group called out the Republicans by saying that they “could not even support a bipartisan investigation into a deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol reflects dangerously misplaced priorities: they have chosen party over country, obstruction over progress, and Trump over democracy.”

The group added, with “inability and unwillingness” from Republicans “to defend our democracy,” the coalition believes “it is clearer than ever that the filibuster needs to be eliminated.”

It added that America is witnessing the “greatest contraction of voting rights since the end of Reconstruction and the beginning of Jim Crow,” since it also thinks passing S.1, also known as the For the People Act, “is essential in light of these attacks on Americans’ fundamental voting and civil rights.”

“We cannot allow the filibuster to stand in the way of progress or imperil the health of our democracy,” the far-left group added, noting that there should be an investigation into January 6 and some legislation passed to protect the voting rights of Americans.

Currently, the Senate is tied at 50 Republicans and 50 senators who caucus with the Democrats. Unlike the House of Representatives, the Senate is able to break a tie with the vice president voting. Currently, the Democrats have the power, as the current vice president is a Democrat.

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