Dan Gibbs Writes Post for the U.S. Politics and Policy Blog of the London School of Economics

Dan Gibbs, Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and PPE Core Faculty member, wrote a post for LSE’s US Politics and Policy blog titled “Senators Use Obstruction Like the Filibuster to Signal Policy Priorities to Key Constituencies.”

Here is a brief excerpt of the blog post: The filibuster is a parliamentary procedure in the US Senate in which a Senator speaks for an extended period to delay or block a vote on a bill. It is often associated with the requirement for a supermajority vote (60 out of 100 senators) to end debate and proceed to a vote on the legislation, a process known as invoking cloture.

While filibusters and invoking cloture can be viable policymaking tactics for a party that believes it can wait its opponent out, the fate of a bill in the Senate is often known in advance of a filibuster or cloture vote. In 2021, for example, majority leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat from New York state, introduced the…