White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki had to plow through MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan’s interruptions to complete her answer on President Joe Biden’s push for voting rights.
Ms. Psaki was Mr. Hasan’s guest on Thursday night’s edition of MSNBC’s The 11th Hour, during which the subject of voting rights came up.
Hasan asked about the president’s speech in support of the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, during which he called for an exception or other change to the Senate rules.
“Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was on the show last night, and she said that the president came too late to the fight on voting rights and especially the filibuster, that he dragged his feet,” Hasan said, adding “it’s kind of hard to disagree with that.”
He then played a few seconds of one of the many times Psaki or Biden have been asked to death about the filibuster. Psaki told that reporter that Biden’s “view and his position hasn’t changed” regarding the filibuster.
“Jen, why wait almost a year to change his view, and come out so publicly against the filibuster, to give the rousing speech in Atlanta that he finally gave this month?” Hasan asked. “We lost all of 2021 while he waited for bipartisanship.
“Well, first, Mehdi, that wasn’t the first speech
“First time he came out publicly against the filibuster!” Hasan interrupted.
“That’s true, I’m…” Psaki said as Hasan continued “First time he came out so explicitly on the filibuster on voting rights!”
“I’m getting there. I agree with you, Mehdi, I agree with you. I’m getting there,” Psaki said, then continued her response.
It’s important for people to know and understand. He also signed a historic executive order on voting rights within the first few weeks of taking office. I think the argument that if he had gone a year earlier and came out against the filibuster would have changed the votes or the views of Senator Sinema and Senator Manchin, we have not seen that play out to be fact.It’s also true that there were others who may not have been for changes to the filibuster earlier on, who came around and are more united around that. So now we’ve we’re building support, we have to keep fighting and keep at it. But voting rights legislation and fighting for that is something the president has been doing long before he was inaugurated, for decades now in public life, and he’s going to keep fighting for it.
Hasan is only half-right. It is true that the speech in Atlanta was Biden’s most forceful and explicit statement about changing Senate rules, but it did not represent a change in his position. For almost three years, Biden has been saying that if there’s no other way to move forward, he would be willing to support getting rid of the filibuster,
Watch above via MSNBC.