In his first address as Senate Majority Leader, John Thune (R-SD) reaffirmed his support for the legislative filibuster and its role in moderating contentious issues in the Senate. 

That's as it should be.

“One of my priorities as leader will be to ensure that the Senate stays the Senate. That means preserving the legislative filibuster — the Senate rule that today has perhaps the greatest impact in preserving the Founders’ vision of the Senate,” Thune said in prepared remarks obtained by The Hill.

The Senate begins the new Congress on Friday afternoon, and Thune is expected to make the remarks from the floor sometime after the Senate opens for business at noon.

Thune and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) both pledged to preserve the filibuster when they ran in the fall to succeed outgoing Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.).

During his first term, President Donald Trump at one point called for the elimination of the filibuster.

In 2017, Trump called on Senate Republicans to ditch the filibuster when it threatened to slow his agenda.

“Republicans in the Senate will NEVER win if they don’t go to a 51 vote majority NOW. They look like fools and are just wasting time,” he wrote at the time.

It's normally Democrats calling for an end to the filibuster, often citing "democracy" when so doing, even though the United States is not and never has been a democracy. The filibuster, a long-standing Senate rule, exists for a reason, that being so that the upper house of the national legislature does not give in (entirely) to partisan passions.

See Related: Oh, So *Now* the Dems Like the Filibuster

Senate Democrats Give Themselves Whiplash on the Filibuster, and Kyrsten Sinema Has Thoughts

The problem with one party eliminating this tradition is that the "shoe on the other foot rule" will, sooner or later, apply. Case in point: In his term as Senate Majority Leader, we must remember that Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) drove a rule change eliminating the filibuster for lower court judge nominees, allowing a raft of Obama-appointed federal judges to be approved on a simple majority, party-line vote. Later, that shoe went on the other foot; the Republicans gained control of the Senate, and Senator Reid's rule change came back to haunt him when the Republican Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, oversaw the same removal of the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees.

The result? Three Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices.

Senator Thune went on to lay out some other priorities:

He declares that Republicans “have a lot to do this Congress.”

He ticked off border security, extending the Trump-era Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, deregulation, border security and defense spending as items atop the GOP agenda.

He also pledges to restore order to the dysfunctional congressional appropriations process, which remains in a state of limbo after Congress passed a stopgap government funding measure lasting until March 14.

The 119th Congress has convened as of Friday, January 3rd, 2025. It's already looking to be an interesting session.

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