The Senate Is Making a Mockery of Itself
About this episode
Former Senate aide Adam Jentleson explains how the filibuster transformed the Senate from a majoritarian body into one where nearly everything requires 60 votes. He traces the shift from the 19th century through the civil rights era, when Southern segregationists perfected obstruction, to Mitch McConnell's use of the filibuster as a routine supermajority requirement under Obama. Jentleson argues the modern filibuster inverts the founders' design, giving a minority representing far fewer Americans a permanent veto, and that its survival owes more to senators' nostalgia and institutional vanity than to principle. The episode also covers budget reconciliation as a workaround, the prospects for reform under a Democratic majority, and Jentleson's proposals such as a talking filibuster.