Scott Brown was elected by the voters of Massachusetts back on January 19th. Yet, 2 weeks and a day later he hasn’t been seated in the United States Senate. That’s all well and good, since the commonwealth of Massachusetts had to wait on military ballots and verify the count.
But once the election happened, many contend that interim Senator Paul Kirk should have lost his right to vote in the Senate, and Harry Reid told a worried public the Senate “wouldn’t rush into anything.” Yet they did and Bill Wilson of Americans for Limited Government called them on it:
“Anything means everything, not just health care,” said Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson. “Since Scott Brown’s overwhelming election, Senate Majority Leader Reid has scheduled and won votes that may have been contested or even blocked had Brown been seated.”
Scott Brown was elected to the open Massachusetts Senate seat on January 19th. But Reid has refused to seat the Senator-elect until February 11th.
“The people of Massachusetts elected Scott Brown to be the 41st vote against any and all controversial items as necessary, not just health care, and they’re already being deprived of their due representation,” Wilson said.
“Reid lied, there’s no simpler way of putting it,” Wilson added, pointing to Reid’s pledge after the Brown election: “We’re not going to rush into anything,” as reported by Politico.
Since then, the Senate has voted to raise the debt ceiling by $1.9 trillion, confirmed Ben Bernanke to a second term as Fed Chair, invoked cloture on Patricia Smith for Solicitor of Labor, “and now is moving to get Craig Becker onto the National Labor Relations Board,” Wilson noted.
Wilson said that “merely having Brown seated would have defeated the debt ceiling increase and Patricia Smith because no Republicans supported those two, and Senate Democrats would not have had 60 votes needed for passage. If Brown had been seated, it is highly likely Reid would not have even brought those items to the floor.”
Wilson added that “clearly indicates that the Majority Leader is attempting to rush through as much as he possibly can get away with prior to Brown’s seating, despite his vow not to. He is thumbing his nose at the American people. It’s disgusting.”
Wilson said Reid knows everything will change when Brown is seated, “and in the meantime is attempting to paint a misleading portrait of obstructionism, when quite the opposite is true.”
“Washington may be dumbfounded that Reid would lie about ramming important pieces of legislation and nominees through without seating Brown, but there is so little accountability in the nation’s capital it’s not at all surprising.
“These items would not have passed had Brown been seated, and there will be even more next week,” Wilson said, concluding, “which robs the people of Massachusetts their due representation on these critical issues facing the nation.”
Most of the time it doesn’t make a significant difference when a Senator is selected in a special election following the death of his or her predecessor, and had Martha Coakley been the winner I doubt the Senate leadership would’ve waited around to seat her.
But Scott Brown is “Mr. 41” and obviously he makes a difference to the balance of power. Ironically, it took a change in the law to place Paul Kirk in the Senate – before Ted Kennedy passed away he asked that Massachusetts repeal a 2004 law that wouldn’t have allowed then-Governor Mitt Romney to appoint a replacement for Sen. John Kerry. Had that law not been hastily passed, we would’ve seen a 59-40 Democrat majority in the Senate since Kennedy’s death and the dynamics of the body would’ve been significantly different.
So Harry Reid is trying to ram through everything he can at lightning speed before Scott Brown is rightfully seated. Partisan politics rears its ugly head as has often been the case over the last few years, and America isn’t being well served by it.
