History was made in March 2025 by the Senator of New Jersey, Cory Booker. Booker took the floor with an “intention of disrupting the normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able.” Cory Booker successfully broke the longest-standing filibuster, which was first held by Sen. Strom Thurmond in 1957, as he was fighting against the Civil Rights Act. A filibuster is defined as an action―such as a prolonged speech―that obstructs progress in a legislative assembly. Many senators have taken the floor to stop a law from being enacted.
His speech, which was not technically considered a filibuster because it didn’t directly prevent a law from being enacted, lasted 25 hours and six minutes, surpassing Thurmond’s record of 24 hours and 18 minutes.
Booker live-streamed the whole 25 hours on different platforms for all of America to tune in on, including the popular social media platform TikTok. Booker did not go into this speech with an intention to break the record, he went in with the idea that he was going to break the silence within the government. He was joined by colleagues who tagged in to give him a few minutes of break time. This consisted of his fellow senate democrats asking questions to relieve him of his speaking. He approached the Senate with letters from residents of the state of New Jersey and all over the nation expressing their deepest concerns and worries about their country. Citizens countrywide watched Booker carry the frustration that the “Democrats have felt in the aftermath of the GOP’s electoral victories last year.”
Throughout the 25 hours he spoke, he never ran out of issues to discuss. This is significant because it shows the drastic state of our nation right now, and the number of problems and issues there must be to make it possible for him to barely repeat anything he said in a 25-hour speech. Booker touched on “a range of Trump administration policies and GOP legislative plans, including Trump’s plans for tariffs, the Elon Musk-led effort to slash the federal bureaucracy, and the potential cuts to Medicaid embedded in a House GOP budget plan.” Booker continuously talked about Trump’s foreign policies and his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
What many Americans admire about Booker is his ability to get up and do something; Something many Americans wish their party would do more of. Booker took this opportunity to get up on the political stage and protest for what is right and what is clearly wrong in America right now.
Booker included that “these are not normal times in our nation, and they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate.” He came prepared as reporters say, “He stopped eating on Friday, he said, and then stopped drinking on Sunday night.” The drive and commitment Booker had is so inspiring for Americans to see. This provides a light of hope in these dark times. Although the fight for a difference in the government should’ve happened earlier, Booker gave all he had and definitely wrote his name into history, kicking off the movement to a greater nation. Whether this works or not, it certainly shook the political conversation up for the better.
