Senate Democrats on Tuesday introduced a pared-down voting bill — with support from both progressive and centrist wings of the party — aimed at expanding voter access and countering nationwide Republican-led efforts to alter election laws.

Why it matters: The Freedom to Vote Act is the product of negotiations overseen by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and was built of a framework put forward by Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), whose vote is crucial to Democratic efforts to advance legislation in the chamber.

GOP Senators on Tuesday evening blocked their Democratic colleagues' attempt to advance the For the People Act, the sweeping election reform bill. This partisan gridlock in the evenly split Senate ensures a rocky path forward for any of the Democrats' legislative priorities.

In the days leading up to the Senate vote on the House-passed elections bill, Republicans offered several misleading talking points about the Democratic bill, and made other statements that required more context.

Republicans said the bill would direct taxpayer money to publicly finance federal campaigns. The matching campaign money would come from a new surcharge added to certain criminal fines and civil settlements involving corporate defendants and their executive officers.

Because of Senate rules, Democrats were unable to pass their voting "rights" bill this week, so now more of them want to change the rules.

"You know, there's a reality," Sen. Bob Menendez told CNN's Jake Tapper on Wednesday.

"The reality is that we don't have 60 votes in the United States Senate, and for so long as the filibuster rule continues to be the rule in the history of the Senate, then we're going to have a challenge on some of these big things.

"But I will say it takes two to tango," Menendez continued.

An attempted federal takeover of elections was thwarted Tuesday, as Senate Republicans voted to block further debate on the legislation. 

With Vice President Kamala Harris presiding and prepared to cast a potential tie-breaking vote, the Senate divided 50-50 on a straight party-line vote. It would have taken 60 votes to proceed to debate and a vote. 

The filibuster is here to stay, for now.

And that’s posing a challenge to President Joe Biden and Democrats in Congress confronting a wall of Republican opposition led by Senate leader Mitch McConnell’s “100%” focus on stopping their agenda.

Senate Republicans filibustered Democrats' signature voting rights bill on Tuesday, denying it the 60 votes needed to advance the bill and start debate.

Why it matters: It's an expected-but-significant blow to Democrats' hopes of passing a sweeping federal elections overhaul to combat a wave of new voting restrictions in Republican-led states.

President Biden will deliver remarks next week on expanding access to voting, amid uncertainty about how Democrats can advance their voting rights agenda after Senate Republicans blocked a sweeping election reform bill.

“This is a continuation of his efforts to use the bully pulpit to elevate this issue, just as he did last week when he marked Juneteenth and also as he did in Tulsa, Oklahoma, just a week before that,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Wednesday.

After nearly six months of watching Republicans relentlessly make it harder to vote in the US, Democrats suffered a major blow on Tuesday after GOP senators used a legislative maneuver to halt a sweeping voting rights and ethics bill.