Clyburn: Filibuster Shouldn’t Apply to Constitutional Issues Like Roe, Privacy Rights

On Saturday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Velshi,” House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC) said that “the filibuster ought not apply to anything akin to a constitutional issue.” And so Roe v. Wade “ought not be subjected to a filibuster.” 

Clyburn said, “I’ve said, coupled with that, voting rights, like all other constitutional rights, ought not be subjected to the whims of any one person. And so, the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade made it very clear that embedded in the Constitution of the United States, the women’s right to choose is there. Privacy rights, that’s what they rested upon, and nothing is more private than this kind of a situation. And so, I think it is very clear that the filibuster ought not apply to anything akin to a constitutional issue. Because it allows one person to let his or her views take precedence over the Constitution of the United States. And so, I think that Roe v. Wade, founded in the privacy rights of the Constitution, ought not be subjected to a filibuster.”

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