Earlier this evening, the Senate attempted to end debate on the financial reform legislation that it has been considering for the past several weeks; the vote failed, 57-42. Maine Republicans Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins voted along with the Democrats to end debate; Democrats Russ Feingold and Maria Cantwell sided with the Republicans to delay the final vote. Tonight, more amendments will come up for a vote, and Democrats expect another attempt to end debate will come, perhaps as soon as tomorrow.
The Democrats used the failure as an opportunity to lambaste Republicans for siding with Wall Street against Main Street. "I've never seen a party so consistently, passionately defend special interests at the expense of middle-class and poor people," Majority Leader Harry Reid said, hinting that several Republicans had switched their votes at the last minute. (Reid did spend about 10 minutes buttonholing Scott Brown of Massachusetts during the vote, but to no avail.) "It is incomprehensible to me that every Republican save two has said, let the status quo continue," a bemused Bernie Sanders added.
Yet the Democrats should have the votes to end debate. Lame duck Arlen Specter was not on the Hill today after last night's defeat in Pennsylvania, and he missed the vote. Presuming he is not regretting his party switch in a fit of pique, he can be expected to support an up-or-down vote on the financial reform legislation.
The two Democrats who did vote to keep the debate open, Feingold and Cantwell, didn't do so out of opposition to the bill but because they had been unable to vote on their amendment to restore Glass-Steagall, the law separating commercial banks from riskier investment banks. If cloture had been invoked, their amendment could not come up since it is not considered germane to the bill for technical reasons. For now, though, the amendment has been blocked by objections from Republicans to bring the amendments to the floor.
Other amendments, like the Merkley-Levin Volcker rule amendment or Byron Dorgan's bill to end "naked" credit-default swaps, are also suffering under Republican holds but would be considered germane and could be voted on after a cloture vote, which allows 30 more hours for legislators to vote on germane amendments. The authors of these changes all voted "yes " to end debate.
That's why this failed cloture vote is not like others -- the Democrats have the votes, including two Republican supporters, but progressive members of the caucus are fighting to keep the bill on the floor in order to improve it, convinced that Republicans can be induced to stop objecting to procedural moves. Democrats will work to bring their own amendments, and Republican propositions like the Brownback auto dealer amendment, which would weaken the bill, to the floor.
Ultimately, though, if Republicans cannot be convinced to cooperate with the open amendment process, Feingold and Cantwell will likely support the bill, along with Specter, the two Maine senators, and any other GOP converts -- Reid has the votes to get the bill to the floor. Let's hope that in the meantime, any changes strengthen this bill rather than weaken it, which has been the fortuitous pattern of the last few weeks with only a few exceptions.
-- Tim Fernholz
