Sinema says no to filibuster reform scuttling Democrats’ voting rights hopes

• Arizona senator says she will not support filibuster changes
• Sinema's floor speech condemned by voting rights activists

Joe Biden was in crisis talks with Senate Democratic rebels Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema at the White House on Thursday night after they thwarted his high-stakes efforts to push voting rights legislation through Congress, according to several reports.

Even before the US president arrived on Capitol Hill on Thursday afternoon to join Democratic senators for their regular lunch gathering, in a diplomatic public offensive, Sinema of Arizona bluntly reiterated that she would not support any change to filibuster rules to get voting rights passed.