Boy, if you think an Alinskyite consensus formation process is a congressional debate, you've already been hosed.
We have a very nice building, called the US Capitol, where the House of Representatives and the Senate can engage in debate. I'm looking at it right now out my window.
Anything that a Member or a Senator does outside of that building, by way of debates on legislation, is illegitimate.
And any debating regarding legislation that they do with members of the Executive Branch, in public, borders on treason.
Anyone who attended this farce is not fit to serve in Congress.
You are correct. I see that that is the underlying fatal flaw in this whole charade—an attempt to take a congressional debate out of Congress and put it under the manipulative control of a domineering president. You have hit the nail on the head.