Ted Cruz is Giving a Really Long Speech About Obamacare
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tx.) is on the Senate floor, right now, talking about Obamacare, and he's vowed to keep talking "until I am no longer able to stand."
Technically, it's not a filibuster, because it's not blocking any vote.
Over the last several months, Cruz has led the push to defund Obamacare in a continuing resolution to fund the government.
The House passed a bill defunding the health law last week, but Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he would simply strike the defunding language from the bill and send it back to the House.
Cruz has argued that Republicans in the Senate should delay a vote on the defunding bill in order to prevent Reid from stripping the Obamacare-defunding language, but top Senate Republicans Mitch McConnell and John Cornyn said this week that they would proceed with a vote.
"If five Senate Democrats vote against the majority leader, Obamacare will be defunded," That's a vote we should want to have." McConnell said in a statement. "This is a rare opportunity to defund this law with a simple majority. We should have that vote. I just don't happen to think filibustering a bill that defunds Obamacare is the best route to defunding Obamacare. All it does is shut down the government and keep Obamacare funded. And none of us want that."
You can watch Cruz's speech live on C-SPAN 2.