The added language, which is referred to as a “manager’s amendment” and proposed by the committee’s chair, Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, states that the legislation would not “diminish or infringe upon any right protected under the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, including the free exercise of religion.”
There is no need to add such language. No statue can “diminish or infringe upon any right protected under . . . the Constitution . . . .” The hierarchy of law in the United States is the Constitution → statutory law → common law (aka judge made law). In other words, no statute can supersede any part of the Constitution. That added language doesn’t accomplish anything.
Unless the SCOTUS decides the Constitution means something completely other than what it says, of course. See: King Trump ruling which goes against the common English text.
HRC being involved with it makes me immediately wonder how much actual protection there is for trans folks. A4TE being mentioned is a better sign though.
Regardless, at least they are making a token effort here. It’s better than just saying “the GOP has our hands tied, send us more money and we’ll… continue to do nothing”
Per article V there are a couple of ways that amendments are proposed: either with 2/3 of both houses of Congress, or if the legislatures of 2/3 of the states call for a constitutional convention. But actually ratifying the amendment requires 3/4 of the state legislatures to ratify it, or, alternately, 3/4 of the state ratifying conventions.
So a really really high bar, which is why it hasn’t happened lately.
I’m personally much more worried about the constitution being ignored than I am about it being amended. Without a general agreement to actually abide by it, it’s just meaningless words on paper.
Looks like it’s state houses, which to me infers both houses.
There are 28 states with house/senate in GOP control, and 18 in Dem control. Remainder are either coalitions or split. Unlike MTG, I can do math, so 2/3rds (for convention) of 50 is 33 states, so GOP is far too close, especially considering the coalition states. Ratification would be 38 (rounded up).
Normally I would agree with you, but there is talk among MAGA and Project 2025 folks and others about calling a Constitutional Convention and just writing a brand new Constitution from scratch. Right now, 28 states have already been convinced to call for a Constitutional Convention. That is not a typo. 28. They need, as you correctly point out, 2/3 of the states to call for a Convention. That’s 34 states. They are 6 short. They only need to convince 6 states to call a Constitutional Convention. And if they succeed, THERE ARE NO RULES FOR THAT CONVENTION. They can literally create a new Constitution from scratch. We are a lot closer to this happening than people realize.
ETA: To be clear, these 28 states weren’t all recently convinced by MAGA to call for a Convention. Some of these calls happened years ago for various issues. But these states passed measures to call for a Convention, and their calls are still open and have not been rescinded. California is one such state. There are efforts in California to rescind theirs, but more people need to be aware of this so that can happen.
Theoretically, I guess, but if they write a new Constitution that says they only need a simple majority of states, then what? It would be a mess. Like…how would anyone challenge anything that Constitution did? Our current legal system is created by our current Constitution.
Where the fuck was Sheldon Whitehouse? I mean, no surprise that McConnell was AWOL, but with all the talk Whitehouse posts on YT, he better have a fantastic fucking excuse for this no show.
And Chuck Schumer treats it like it’s good news it didn’t pass. It’s just painful.
Chuck’s still waiting for a response to his very strong letter to the White House (with eight very strongly worded questions!). Everyone should just take 'er easy until then, when he can make his next completely feckless fucking move.
Apparently, Whitehouse was en route back from South Korea. Why was he traveling during session? There are plenty of breaks in the Senate schedule to take trips.
As I mentioned somewhere recently, the only explanation for some of this behavior is that some of these people still do not believe that Trump really is a fascist dictator. They think that talk is just rhetoric and isn’t reality. They are stuck in the 80s/90s/00s political world and they think things are still like that.
