Cornyn Says He Now Opposes Scrapping the Filibuster

Senator John Cornyn of Texas said Tuesday that he does not support doing away with the filibuster, in a change from the position he adopted earlier this year while he was running for reelection.

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In a March op-ed, Cornyn, who would go on to lose his primary to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, wrote that he supported “whatever changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary” to pass the SAVE America Act, but he is now much cooler on the prospect of altering Senate rules.

“I said I was open to changes in the filibuster, but I was intentionally not very specific,” Cornyn told National Review of his March position. “I’m happy to have that conversation, but I’m not prepared to vote to overturn the filibuster at this time.”

Cornyn’s comments come as he has applied increasing pressure on President Donald Trump’s administration in the aftermath of his primary loss, most recently demanding concessions to vote to advance attorney general nominee Todd Blanche out of committee.

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Prior to this year, Cornyn was a staunch proponent of keeping the Senate’s rules as they are. As Democrats attempted to hollow out the filibuster while they held a governing trifecta in 2022, Cornyn defended it as an institution that encourages lawmakers to “discuss things together, to debate them, to think about the consequences, both intended and unintended, and to pass laws which will endure the test of time.”

That position earned Cornyn attacks during the primary from Paxton and Representative Wesley Hunt, his other primary opponent. Eventually, Cornyn said he supported a rule change. “The Democrats’ recklessness and radicalism have changed the landscape,” he wrote in his March op-ed. “On these critical issues, at this critical hour, the old procedures no longer align with the core American principles we must defend.”

Last week, however, he shouted out a Wall Street Journal op-ed from his colleague, John Curtis, in which the Utah senator declared that, “Under no circumstance will I support any effort to end or alter the filibuster.” Also last week, Cornyn estimated that half of his Senate Republican colleagues opposed scrapping the filibuster for the sake of the SAVE America Act.

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