Cord Byrd: “A majority leader has enormous power when it comes to the schedule of the Senate, the scheduling of bills and…”

“A majority leader has enormous power when it comes to the schedule of the Senate, the scheduling of bills and resolutions, and the programming of the Senate schedule. The majority leader has first recognition power and that is a big arrow in his arsenal. He has the power of first recognition. Nobody can get recognition before the majority leader. If he has the power of first recognition, then he can make a motion that is nondebatable. He can sit down if he wants to. If someone wants to put in a quorum call, that is OK. Let the quorums chew up the rest of the 2 hours. That motion is in there. That nondebatable motion is still pending before the Senate after that 2 hours. At least that is the way I recall it. But there is a nondebatable motion. Why has not rule VII or VIII been used? So we have had all of these motions to proceed. The Republicans objected. Then we slapped in cloture motions. That has been called a filibuster. There is no filibuster. That is a threat to filibuster. But again, the majority leader has the power to go to something else.”