Dear John,

If you are like me, you have no patience for all the handwringing by Democratic lawmakers in Washington over the Supreme Court’s regressive decisions on abortion, guns, and the environment.

“This MAGA, regressive, extremist Supreme Court is intent on setting America back decades, if not centuries.” -- Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer

Well, yes, that’s true. So what are we going to do about it?! Last I checked, Democrats were still in control of the Senate, House, and the presidency. This means Democrats still have the power to effectively overrule the Supreme Court on reproductive rights, gun control, and the environment.

Now, I understand that the Democrats have to cope with a filibuster in the Senate. But they need only fifty votes (plus the Vice President) to carve out exceptions to the filibuster. We know this: Historically there have been some 160 carve-outs to bypass the filibuster^[1], including one for confirming Supreme Court nominees (made possible by Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans).

If Mitch McConnell can kill the filibuster to confirm three Trump nominees to a lifetime appointment on the Supreme Court, the least Democrats can do is carve out a filibuster exemption to protect the rights those justices are sabotaging.

Plus, if Republicans regain control of the Senate, you can bet they’ll carve out exceptions to the filibuster for whatever they want to do. As soon as they get the chance, they may abolish the filibuster altogether.

So, can Senate Democrats muster 50 votes for filibuster carve-outs while they still have the power?

While Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrstin Sinema were reluctant to agree to such carve-outs before, the situation has changed now that the Supreme Court has reversed Roe and Manchin has expressed outrage at being lied to by Kavanaugh and Gorsuch. And we can’t let Republicans off the hook here, either. Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski is up for reelection this fall. Last February, she and Senator Susan Collins introduced the Reproductive Choice Act, to prevent women’s reproductive choices from being weakened or eliminated.

If Manchin, Murkowski, and Collins are truly outraged, they all have an easy fix: They can carve out a reproductive rights exemption to the filibuster and codify by majority vote abortion rights nationwide. Join me in calling on them to step up and get it done now.

Codifying abortion rights is not only crucial to the future of our nation, it’s critically important for Democrats facing midterm elections four months from now too. Reproductive rights are a hugely galvanizing issue for Democrats and Independents. However, many expect Democrats to lose control over both houses of Congress in the midterms, regardless.

To that I say: Defeatism is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Midterm elections are all about turnout. Young people and college-educated voters made all the difference in the last midterms in 2018 -- giving Democrats control of the House by a wide margin. Let me remind you that the Democratic House has passed a slew of bills since these voters gave them control. It’s the Senate filibuster that has blocked those bills from passage!

While young people usually don’t pay much attention to midterm elections, a record 36 percent of them voted in 2018, in contrast to 20 percent in 2014.^[2] Turnout of college-educated voters -- another critical voting constituency to the Democratic Party, and also a majority of Independents who vote in midterms -- also spiked in the 2018 midterms.

True, Trump was a driving force for both groups in 2018. But it’s not as if Trump -- or Trumpism -- has disappeared. His attempted coup continues to this day. And the Supreme Court’s extraordinary rightward lurch on reproductive rights, guns, and the environment would not have occurred but for Trump’s three Supreme Court appointees.

So, we can sit back and accept defeat, or we can do whatever we can to push for action. I choose action and I hope you will too by joining me and adding your name today.

There’s a chance we might not succeed. I also know we are guaranteed to fail if we don’t even try.

Thank you for standing with me and standing on the side of action.

Robert Reich
Inequality Media Civic Action

^{[1] Fact-check: Have there been about 160 carve-outs to the filibuster?, Politifact
[2] Young people actually rocked the vote in 2018, new Census Bureau data finds, Washington Post}