Now that it’s passed the House it goes to the Senate. Assuming that the 58 Dems vote in favor of a repeal and Snowe and Brown do what they’ve pledged it will have enough votes to pass the Senate unless Snowe and Brown also do what they’ve pledged and block the legislation until the tax cuts are extended.
What do you think the odds are of it clearing the Senate? And which do you think will kill it first- the “no legislation til tax cuts are extended” block, Snowe or Brown voting against the repeal, or a Democrat voting against party lines?
I wish that I thought the extending of tax cuts to the rich would politically backfire but it will be 2 years before the next elections and by that time it may as well have been the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
Well, we know that Manchin will vote against party lines, because he did so last time, so the Democrats have to get Snowe-Brown-Murkowski, all of whom having come out in favor of repeal. It comes down to “no legislation til tax cuts are extended”. If the House passes the tax cut extension as is, DADT will be repealed. If the House stalls it or amends it to keep the estate tax, it’s not going to happen.
I saw an interview on CNN with Joe Lieberman (sorry, no cite) and he claimed there were 61, maybe 62, votes lined up in favor of repeal. Barring impediments like the tax cut stuff if it gets to the floor for an up/down vote it seems it will pass and DADT will be history.
Brown, Murkowski and the ladies from Maine have said they’d vote for the standalone bill. So them plus the folks who voted for it last time plus Blanche Lincoln (who apparently was at a dentist appointment lastime, but said she’d vote ‘yea’) is 61 votes. And its passed the House. So it’ll pass if the Dems can get it to the floor.
I have no concept of whats involved in getting a bill to the floor in a time crunch, especially when there are like, eight other things they want to vote on before the end of the year. So even though it seems pretty clear it will pass if brought to a vote, I can’t really speak to the liklihood of that happening.
Here’ the cite for the GOP senators support of the bill.
Here is a link to the video of Lieberman talking about this issue and who he has lined up to vote for repeal. It sounds to me as if Harry Reid is the one dragging his feet about bringing this up for a vote. Why Reid would do that escapes me.
Because both Brown and Murkowski have said they’ll only vote for it after the tax cut bill passes, so bringing it to a vote before that won’t do much good. Also, Reid’s more interested in getting START and the budget passed, so he’s focusing on those first.
DADT cloture vote is scheduled for Saturday. Given that repeal has a one vote margin of error, I’d say there’s probably a 80% chance of the answer to the OP’s question being “yes”.
Good news: The tax cut bill passed the House unchanged very late last night and Obama will sign it today.
Bad news: Senator Wyden (D-OR) has early stage prostate cancer and is scheduled for surgery. He planned the surgery before he knew that the lame duck session would go so late. As a result of this, he will be out of commission for the rest of this week and all of next week.
Other news: The Russian treaty and the budget bill could take priority in the Senate before DADT.
DADT repeal has moved forward to debate, 63-33, and debate and final vote is expected to take place either later today or tomorrow. The following Republicans voted yes: Collins, Snowe, Brown, Murkowski, Voinavich, and Kirk.
The opponents of DADT have waived the 30 hours of debate that they are allowed under the rules. The final vote will be held in two hours.
After passage, DADT doesn’t go away. There will be a 30 day review on how to implement the new law and then things will start to happen. It could take months for it to be totally revoked. That said, this is a call for celebration.
I think we will look back on this as a critical inflection point in the process of accepting gays in our society. It was almost 20 years between the decision to integrate the military and the ruling in *Loving *but the SCOTUS. I wonder if it will be less than 20 years for SSM.
