(#4630) Yesterday on the Senate floor

      When I turned on C-span2 yesterday morning Senator Sinema was presiding over the Senate. During her time in the President of the Senate's chair, no less than half a dozen or more republican senators came over to her and had conversations with her during vote counts. Only one democratic Senator visited her during that time and it was senator Manchin, with whom she seemed to huddle in a whispered conversation. The other republican senators were not so close in their conversations with her but they were right there at her chair. I was watching intently from the viewpoint of the two cameras that switched back and forth to cover both sides of the Senate chamber.
     I know how much she relishes her role as a bipartisan Senator and how much she seems to favor the republican members a bit too much in my estimation. So watching the manner of those conversations with those more than a handful republican Senators who seemed to be doing a tag team on her had my full attention. The reason I came to that conclusion was because none of them seemed to be happy during and then at the end of their conversations with her. Almost as if they were pleading some case with her and were not getting the result they expected. Now that could be just me and my distrust of her manufacturing a conclusion, but I don't think so.
     Not one of the republicans who came away from their impromptu meeting with Senator Sinema seemed at all satisfied and that is why I think they kept coming up to her chair in a tag team ensemble. I was also watching the democratic Senators to see how they would react to all these republican Senators affectively bombarding her with their presence. Not one democratic Senator seemed to give any notice to it. Normally there is one or two who would be caught staring at the procession of republicans bearing down on one of their colleagues but not yesterday. Almost as if they were in on some predetermined outcome that the republicans were as yet unaware. I hope I am correct here and that Senator Sinema is firmly entrenched with her caucus to get President Biden's agenda finished.