Treasury Secretary Calls for End to Filibuster, Warns of New Shutdown in January

Scott Bessent joined Trump in his call to terminate the Senate rule.

The U.S. Capitol building and the National Mall in Washington, on Nov. 17, 2025. Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said that he wants the Senate to end its filibuster rule, weeks after the longest government shutdown in history was ended, warning that a similar delay tactic may be used again in January to initiate a new shutdown.

In an opinion article published by The Washington Post on Sunday, Bessent suggested that Democrats in the Senate may use the filibuster rule, which requires 60 votes to overcome, to again shut down the government if funding lapses again in January.

Bessent said the filibuster “has been romanticized as the Senate’s guardian of deliberation” in the Senate but is instead a “historical accident that has evolved into a standing veto for the minority.”

“What once seemed like a dignified brake on hasty lawmaking now blocks even routine governance,” the secretary added. “It’s time for Republicans to acknowledge that the filibuster no longer serves the country—and to be prepared to end it.”

Earlier this month, President Donald Trump said in a post on Truth Social and in interviews with media outlets that Republicans should terminate the rule to end the government shutdown. By the middle of November, Congress passed a stopgap measure to reopen the government until Jan. 30, 2026.

“In January, when spending considerations again come due, if Democrats once again choose to shut down the government, then Republicans should immediately end the filibuster,” Bessent said.

Trump warned earlier this month that if Democrats retake the majority in the Senate, they may opt to end the filibuster to pass measures they favor. He started making those demands after Republicans suffered losses in several states during the November elections.

The president added that the rule’s end would allow Republicans to advance his policy agenda and would likely mean the GOP would take fewer losses during the midterm elections.

“The Democrats are far more likely to win the Midterms, and the next Presidential Election, if we don’t do the Termination of the Filibuster (The Nuclear Option!), because it will be impossible for Republicans to get Common Sense Policies done with these Crazed Democrat Lunatics being able to block everything by withholding their votes,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Nov. 4.

However, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said during an interview with the Daily Caller earlier this month that there were “not even close” to enough votes among Republicans to scrap the rule.

Thune said that during a previous call from Democrats in 2022 to end the filibuster to pass their preferred legislative items, at least eight Democratic senators told him in private they were opposed to it but were fearful of the Democratic Party’s voter base to publicly oppose the measure.

The filibuster’s origin, which dates back to the late 18th century, is rooted in the practice of using long speeches to delay legislation, according to the Senate’s website. Think tank Brookings noted in an article that a rule issued by the upper chamber in 1806 ended a “previous question” rule that allowed a simple majority to end debate, creating the possibility for unlimited debate, and noted that it was likely created by mistake.

In his Sunday article, Bessent said that senators later on found that they could “exploit the gap” in the rule to block or delay legislative action, noting that it’s not in the Constitution.