Biden calls for changing Senate rules to allow voting bills to pass

President Biden on Tuesday gave his full-throated endorsement for changing Senate rules to allow federal voting rights legislation to pass via a simple majority instead of a 60-vote threshold.

Biden has in the past expressed an openness to tweaking Senate rules, such as reinstating the talking filibuster. But in Tuesday’s remarks, he made clear he supports changing the rules “whichever way they need to be changed to prevent a minority of senators from blocking action on voting rights," setting the stage for a high stakes fight in the Senate.

“Sadly, the U.S. Senate, designed to be the world’s greatest deliberative body, has been rendered a shell of its former self. It gives me no satisfaction in saying that as an institutionalist, as a man who was honored to serve in the Senate,” Biden said. “But as an institutionalist, I believe the threat to our democracy is so grave that we must find a way to pass these voting rights bills.

“Debate them, vote, let the majority prevail,” Biden continued. “And if that bare minimum is blocked, we have no option but to change the Senate rules, including getting rid of the filibuster for this.”