TAKING STOCK OF THE SENATE
The Hartmann Report
Thom Hartmann
4.5 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 1 October 2020
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Eli Zupnick, Communications Director for Fix Our Senate joins Thom to discuss the role of the Senate filibuster. Also, how could Democrats be playing hardball on the Senate confirmation of 'Aunty Amy'?
If we go the 12th amendment route of letting state legislatures elect president, would that be the old state bodies or the post-election version? Could special elections shift the balance of power in the Senate even without a blue wave?
And Mark Pocan- one of the Progressive leaders in Congress- takes listener calls.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is the Tom Hartman Program. |
| 0:16.0 | Tom Hartman here with you on the line with us is Be Combs Director for Fix Our Senate. |
| 0:20.6 | FixOurScenet.org is the website and is an Eli Zoptik. |
| 0:25.6 | Eli, thank you for having me on. |
| 0:27.4 | Eli, fixourScenet.org is the website and the Twitter handle is Eli Zoptik, E-L-I-Z-U-P-N-I-C-K. |
| 0:34.2 | Eli, tell us what do we need to do to fix our Senate? |
| 0:37.6 | That's a great question. |
| 0:39.6 | So anyone who right now is working on issues or working to change the way the government looks in November |
| 0:47.2 | needs to understand that unless we fix our Senate, unless we eliminate the filibuster |
| 0:52.4 | as a tool that Mitch McConnell can use to block anything from the minority, then anything |
| 0:58.6 | that we're working on right now is just not going to happen. |
| 1:01.4 | If you care about the climate crisis, if you care about gun safety, if you care about economic |
| 1:05.4 | inequality, immigration, none of these issues can move. |
| 1:08.9 | We can't make progress on anything unless we fix the Senate and unless the filibuster is eliminated. |
| 1:14.4 | So what fixourScenet is trying to do is help people understand that connection that we are all very |
| 1:20.4 | focused on November. |
| 1:21.4 | We're all very focused on doing what we need to do right now. |
| 1:25.0 | We see right now how broken the Senate is with McConnell trying to jam through the Supreme |
| 1:28.9 | Court nominee in an unprecedented way. |
| 1:31.8 | So we're making sure people understand that it's not enough to just change things in November. |
| 1:36.4 | We also need to change the Senate so that we can actually fix our government, restore our |
| 1:40.4 | democracy and make progress on these issues. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Thom Hartmann, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Thom Hartmann and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.