As expected, the Republicans have succeeded in invoking cloture and stopping the attempted filibuster of the Alito nomination. The next step is the actual vote on the nomination, which will take place, as expected, at 11:00am tomorrow.
The final vote was an absolutely amazing 72-25. Since it appears as of now that Alito will get about 60 votes for confirmation tomorrow, that means that more than 10 Democrats crossed lines to vote against Kerry/Kennedy/Kos’s inane filibuster ploy. Make that 19, David Kopel reports that every Republican except John Ensign (who was in a car accident earlier today and unable to vote) voted for cloture as did the following Democrats: Akaka, Baucus, Bingaman, Byrd, Cantwell, Carper, Dorgan, Inouye, Johnson, Landrieu, Lieberman, Lincoln, Kohl, Nelson (Florida), Nelson (Nebraska), Rockefeller, and Salazar. Here’s the final roll call.
Here’s the Washington Post’s report on the vote.
By a 72-25 vote, the Senate cut off a symbolic filibuster attempt today on the Supreme Court nomination of Samuel A. Alito Jr., all but assuring that the federal appeals court judge will be confirmed Tuesday morning by the Senate.
(…)
Massachusetts’ two Democratic senators, Edward M. Kennedy and John F. Kerry, went through the motions of seeking a continuation of debate to make their case against Alito but acknowledged in their short speeches that the odds were heavily against them. While they received 25 votes to continue, those votes were cast with the knowledge that the effort to end debate would pass
In other words, they knew they were going to lose, making those 25 votes even more meaningless. More at CNN
This is already making the folks over at DailyKos very unhappy, which just makes me think this is the best possible news there could be. Ann Althouse reports on this angle as well, including comments that make it look like the Kos-ites are longing for a purge.
Michelle Malkin live-blogged Ted Kennedy’s diatribe this afternoon. It sounds like the Senator nearly blew a gasket this time.
Technorati Tags: Alito, Samuel Alito, SCOTUS, Supreme Court
