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In the Senate, the term “UC” stands for “unanimous consent,” a shorthand for a verbal agreement that all senators would normally take up and pass a bill quickly. But with just months until the November election, it might mean more like, “You see? Our political opponents are completely wrong on this issue.”
As the political world’s focus shifts to the upcoming battle for control of Congress and the White House, lawmakers are spending most of their time cornering their rivals on key issues rather than actual legislative work.
On the Senate floor in recent days, those efforts have often taken the form of unanimous consent requests designed to fail, with one party notable refusal to agree to policy proposals.
Such procedural skirmishes are a shortcut to a Senate showdown on divisive issues and subjects where one party sees an advantage, as was the case on Tuesday, when Democrats rushed to pass a bill to outlaw bump stocks after the Supreme Court struck down a ban on them last week.
As with similar recent ploys, Democrats knew that the UC attempt would fail due to Republican opposition, but they tried it anyway to create a talking point against Republicans.
“Today’s bill returns us to the status quo that Donald Trump put in place, which is that bump stocks are dangerous and should be banned,” Sen. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, said Tuesday. “Senate Republicans generally supported Donald Trump’s bump stock ban then, and they should support this bill today.”
They didn’t.
“I support the Supreme Court,” said Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who said he would prefer to comply with the court’s ruling rather than be crushed by Democrats. “This is all political posturing for an election.”
The swift exchange of words was typical of the genre: the bump stock case, which involved a Supreme Court decision to strike down a ban on devices that increase the rate of fire on semi-automatic rifles, which the Trump administration enacted in the wake of the 2017 Las Vegas concert shooting.
Last week, the battlegrounds at UC were Supreme Court ethics and in vitro fertilization, and in the coming weeks, the conflict over abortion rights and other topics are likely to emerge even more in the heated election race.
Here’s how it works: A senator from one party stands on the floor, says there is an emergency and asks for unanimous consent — the consent of all 100 senators — to immediately take up and pass this bill or that bill without debate.
Senators who sponsor a bill state the rationale for it, even though it’s highly unlikely to pass quickly. Opposing senators are allowed to state their opposition before finally raising their objections and blocking the bill in a chamber where it’s nearly impossible to move quickly if someone objects.
“The objection is granted,” the chairman declares. And that’s it. Numerous news releases are issued highlighting the initiative and efforts to block it.
It may seem like a waste of time and energy, but this staging allows each party to show where the battle lines are drawn on certain issues. Despite the limitations, some senators have embraced the strategy, especially as bill and amendment votes in the Senate have declined in recent years.
“UC is the only way to draw a contrast and put a political marker in the ground to show that Republicans are blocking common-sense measures to prevent gun violence,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. “From a practical standpoint, UC may seem like a waste, but Republicans have to risk it, and that takes very little time.”
As for Blumenthal’s latter point, the tactic is streamlined and much quicker than forcing a roll-call vote on a similar politically sensitive issue through cumbersome and lengthy procedures, which can take days to conduct but have the advantage of allowing each senator to voice their opinion, rather than a single senator expressing blanket opposition.
Democrats believe the IVF Protection Act would have such a significant impact that they held an unsuccessful test vote last week, forcing every Republican to take a position. All but two voted no. To soften the blow, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, asked the Senate to agree unanimously to pass a Republican version of the IVF Protection Act that Democrats consider woefully inadequate. There was an objection.
“Senate Democrats don’t want to protect IVF,” Cruz argued after the bill was blocked. “They just want to make it an election issue.”
Republicans last week unanimously blocked a Democratic-sponsored ethics measure for the Supreme Court, a move that has quieted some of the pressure from progressive Supreme Court activists to step up efforts to increase oversight of the court.
Democrats have made various efforts in recent weeks to highlight their differences with Republicans, from forcing votes to pushing demands at the University of California on border policy, abortion rights and now bump stock gun safety. Republicans have taken notice.
“This is the third week of Chuck Schumer focusing on fake issues instead of real issues,” J.D. Vance, an Ohio Republican, told reporters on Monday.
Schumer has not been shy about acknowledging the political ramifications of recent legislative activity in Congress, but he also said a bump stock bill introduced by New Mexico Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich should receive unanimous support, given that a ban is already in place with bipartisan support.
“It should take five minutes to pass a bill banning bump stocks,” he said.
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