Senate Republicans, along with GOP lawmakers in the House, know that Sen. Ted Cruz and his colleagues don’t have the votes to pass a continuing resolution to defund Obamacare. They don’t even have the votes — 41 in the Senate — to successfully filibuster a resolution that does fund Obamacare. But some had hoped that Cruz & Co. could at least stage an old-fashioned talking filibuster — like Sen. Rand Paul’s March filibuster against U.S. drone policy — that would at least be a high-profile symbol of Republican opposition to the president’s national health care law.
Now, it turns out they can’t even do that. “We won’t have an opportunity to filibuster,” says a Senate Republican aide. “It’s going to be a simple majority vote.”
As the aide explained it, when the House passes a continuing resolution that defunds Obamacare and sends it to the Senate, several things will happen. There will be cloture votes on a motion to proceed and a motion to actually take up the defunding resolution.
