As Senator Cory Booker waged a talking filibuster for more than 18 hours and counting on Tuesday, Democratic senators began jumping in to help with the New Jersey Democrats’ protest of President Trump’s policies.
With assists from New England colleagues including Massachusetts’ two senators, Booker, who first took the floor Monday evening, used his time holding the Senate floor to rail against a swath of policy decisions made by President Donald Trump ranging from deportations to federal workforce reductions.
The show of force comes after Democrats in Congress have faced widespread criticism from their base that they are not doing enough to push back against Trump’s agenda in the early days of his second presidency. As the minority in both chambers, the party has had no ability to stop or slow Trump’s administration from barreling forward.
The “talking filibuster,” as it’s called, is when a senator begins speaking on the Senate floor and refuses to step aside, essentially grinding the chamber to a halt. They are able to let colleagues interject with questions at their discretion, but cannot leave the floor or sit down, which would yield control of the floor back to the majority party. The longest such effort in history lasted a full day.
Booker’s filibuster was not tied to combating a specific piece of legislation moving through the Senate. In a pre-recorded video posted to Booker’s X account shortly after he hit the 13 hour mark, Booker explained that the purpose of his speech was “to use my voice to do what people are calling on me to do,” to fight back against Trump.
It’s been over 13 hours since I started speaking, and I intend to stay on the Senate floor as long as I’m physically able. I’m here to do my job, as a Senator from New Jersey, to lift the voices of Americans who are being harmed by President Trump. I’m am speaking up. pic.twitter.com/dCjhYAP8NL
— Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBooker) April 1, 2025
“I hope I can inspire or engage or activate more people, like you can,” he said, speaking directly to the camera, “to use their voice, because I know that we can stop what’s happening in our country.”
As the hours ticked on, Booker could be seen visibly shifting his weight back and forth, the effect of being required to stand the entire time wearing on him. Colleagues used their questions to supply new talking points to sustain Booker and to highlight their own areas of concern.
Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey of Massachusetts both used their period of questioning to voice their concerns over potential cuts by the Trump administration to Social Security and Medicaid, respectively. Both Senators decried any scale back as a way for Trump to fund tax cuts for the wealthy, which they claim will be to the detriment of everyday Americans.
Markey praised Booker for “drawing our nation’s attention to what Donald Trump and Elon Musk and DOGE are seeking to do to our country, especially the most vulnerable in our society.”
Warren said Social Security “has been the backbone of America’s promise to its own people, that you did the work, you put in the money, and now you’re entitled to benefit on the other side.” She warned that federal workforce cuts will have real-world impacts on the availability and reliability of government services.
Senator Peter Welch, a Vermont Democrat, pulled the early shift to help relieve Booker. In the midst of his questioning period, which started around 6 o’clock Tuesday morning, Welch’s phone alarm went off.
“Pardon me. For those of us who don’t stay up all night, some of us use alarms to wake up,” he quipped.
Welch spoke for about 30 minutes, focusing mainly on immigration policy. He acknowledged the need to secure the country’s borders, but also emphasized the importance of legal immigration.
“We’ve got, in Vermont, a lot of dairy farms, and we have a tourist industry, and we have a hard time filling those jobs. So legal immigration can really be helpful and constructive and beneficial,” he said.
Welch also decried the failure of to pass a bipartisan bill on immigration during the Biden administration, which he said was tanked by Congressional Republicans on the order of Trump, who wanted to avoid giving “the Democrats a win.”
“I never saw this as a win for Democrats,” Welch said. “I saw this is a win for America.”
The late South Carolina Senator Strom Thurmond, a Republican, holds the record for the longest filibuster. He spoke for for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957.
Julian E.J. Sorapuru can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X @JulianSorapuru.
