| Dear 5849376, Yesterday, Senate Democrats led by Majority Leader Harry Reid ended the Republican minority's stranglehold on the confirmation process by taking the first, much-needed step toward filibuster reform. Going forward, every presidential nominee for any position other than Supreme Court justice will get an up-or-down vote, as the framers of the Constitution intended. This represents not only a restoration of the proper role of the Senate in the confirmation process, it also represents a giant shift for Senate Democrats. Since the beginning of the Obama administration, Republicans have pursued a strategy of petty and nakedly political obstructionism. But due to the leadership of Senators Jeff Merkley, Tom Udall and Tom Harkin, who have championed rules reform for years, more and more Senate Democrats decided to take action. This set the stage for yesterday's move to end the filibuster on nominees. Click here to automatically sign the petition thanking Senate Majority Leader Reid and Senators Jeff Merkley, Tom Udall and Tom Harkin for leading this fight. CREDO members have been at the forefront of this fight since 2009. More than 375,000 CREDO members have taken action in support of filibuster reform including more than 200,000 activists who have submitted signatures and more than 15,0000 phone calls this year alone. Our members gathered in the districts offices of ten key senators to lobby for reform. And the CREDO staff met in person with Senators Merkley and Udall to find out how we could best support their reform efforts. On top of that, CREDO donated $50,000 collected from our customers to groups working on filibuster reform. The grassroots activism from CREDO members and the broad coalition that formed to push filibuster reform provided important outside support to the tremendous work by the champions who led this fight inside the Senate. Every time we've had a chance to win real filibuster reform, Democrats have accepted the promises of Republican leadership to respect the rules in the future. And each time Republicans have reneged on that deal. Finally, thanks to organizing in the Senate by Senators Merkley, Udall and Harkin, and in no small part due to activists like you who signed petitions, called Congress and shared the message about filibuster reform with your friends, Senator Reid found the votes to start fixing our broken Senate. Now, in the face of the backlash from FOX News and the Republicans who are hypocritically howling about this rules change, we need to continue standing with the senators who went out on a limb to push rules reform. Click here to automatically sign the petition thanking Senate Majority Leader Reid and Senators Jeff Merkley, Tom Udall and Tom Harkin for leading this fight. While this was a big step, there's still more work to be done to reform the filibuster. President Obama can now fulfill his constitutional duty to end the crisis in the judiciary caused by too many vacancies. But he needs to nominate judges to fill the vacancies, and the Senate needs to take up the baton and schedule hearings and votes in an expeditious manner. In addition, the Republicans' relentless abuse of the filibuster threatens to make the Senate powerless to carry out its legislative duties. The filibuster is why we don't have a public health care option, national background checks on gun purchases, or Wall Street reform that would end too big to fail. Senator Reid and the Senate Democrats need to continue to stand strong and fight to rein in the Republicans who have paralyzed the Senate and made a mockery of the separation of powers with their petty and abusive obstructionism. But if they're going to take those further steps, they need to see that there is broad support for them taking the first step down the road to true filibuster reform. Click here to automatically sign our petition thanking Senate Democrats who supported the rules change, and encouraging them to use all the tools at their disposal to break through the gridlock. Thank you for speaking out. Your activism matters. Matt Lockshin, Campaign Manager
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