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Watch The Retroactive Immunity Vote [UPDATED x4] |
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I want to expand a little bit on what Red Wind has said about the FISA votes today. As Matt Browner-Hamlin points out, this is close to the last waltz for this bill, at least in this round. After this, the bill goes to conference where it has to be reconciled by both the House and the Senate, and then both houses need to vote on it again. There are more opportunities to fight, though the situation looks increasingly bleak.
Matt explains about Chris Dodd and his filibuster promise. Dodd, along with the rest of the Democrats, agreed to a unanimous consent agreement (UC agreement), which stops a filibuster. They did this for a good reason:
The UC agreement included a simple majority vote to strip retroactive immunity from the underlying bill. Dodd had long said that he sought a majority vote on his amendment - that’s why he stopped the SSCI bill cold last December, by refusing UC on the motion to have all amendments require 60 votes. Agreeing to the UC agreement allowed him to have that. Disagreeing would have likely prevented from their being any vote to strip RI from the SSCI bill.
Without the UC agreement, there would simply have been no vote on retroactive immunity. Allowing a simple majority vote on stripping retroactive immunity from this bill, which will happen today, is a great thing. Why? Watch very carefully which Democrats vote against Dodd's amendment to strip out telecom amnesty. The bill only takes 51 votes to pass, and there are 51 members of the Democratic caucus in the Senate. Yet, there will likely be between 6 and 20 Democrats who vote against this amendment.
Notice who votes against stripping retroactive immunity. Write down their names. These are the Senators breaking rank and putting corporate interests above yours. These Senators (and Harry Reid is one of them) represent all that is wrong with the Democratic party. They are the ones continuing the war. They are the ones incessantly caving in to George Bush. This swing block of conservative Democrats - and their counterparts in the House - are the ones who shouldn't get your votes or your money come election time.
But hey, if you feel like sending them emails before the vote, go for it.
Otherwise, you can watch the proceedings below.
UPDATE: Retroactive immunity was passed, 31-67. Roll call coming shortly so you can see who the traitors were.
UPDATE x2: Matt has a rough count up. Eighteen Dems voted for corporate interests. They are Bayh, Inouye, Johnson, Landrieu, McCaskill, Ben Nelson, Bill Nelson, Stabenow, Feinstein, Kohl, Pryor, Rockefeller, Salazar, Carper, Mikulski, Conrad, Webb, and Lincoln (plus Joe Lieberman).
Hillary Clinton missed the vote. Barack Obama did not, and he voted against retroactive immunity.
UPDATE X3: Here's the full roll call vote.
UPDATE X4: The fight now moves to conference and the house. Tell the House to reject telecom immunity!
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This is a new low for the Dems. They had the potential to stop this thing and did not. How disappointing!
Just more of the same…
All the Dems that voted for immunity should be run out of office.
Why don't they just make a policy to roll- over all the time?
It is a very sad state of affairs…this is not the democracy that the Founders envsioned.
Thanks for following this Jason — your procedural explanations have been excellent. Too bad the Democrats have decided that protecting the telecoms is more important than the issue of privacy.
You said in update 2 that Salazar voted Yes, but on the official roll-call page you linked to, it says both Colorado senators Salazar (D) and Allard (R) both voted Nay.
The first update was a rough count, the 2nd was the official role. I'll change it to make it clear. Thanks!
My mistake, my list is correct. Salazar voted for corporate interests, which in this case means he voted against the amendment.
Well the corporations are above the law. This is tantamount to a policeman asking me to rob a bank so we can split the loot. We both get caught but he is automatically above the law and I rise above the law because I was granted immunity. Who were the Republicans that voted against immunity, if any? Has Hillary tried to explain why she missed the vote, other than trying to stay on the fence?
Don't wait for election time. We need local, grass roots recall efforts against these Senators.
Let's see: The Feds can copy your PC hard drive before you legally "enter" the country at the Customs check when arriving from abroad. The stockholder owned Telcos data mined all of us during the Bush "Fear All Campaign" and were probably told not to worry about illegality because we will "take care of it." Thanks AT&T. Thanks Dianne. You win. We, the People, lose…again.
You're not kidding. Some say this is immunity for Bush and Co. too for their warrantless wiretapping crimes.
I won't say this is a "new" low, since many of these same Democrats voted for the Military Commissions Act and the Protect America Act (cough), but it is another shameful performance for these supposed representatives of the public interest. What is the rule–three strikes your out? These Senators need to be challenged on this starting now. Landrieux will likely be replaced by a Republican in the next session, but the others should be dogged by questions about these votes, and the 'sphere should literally and metaphorically post countdown clocks till these Sens' next primary challenges.
Without a doubt–this is the real reason for "retroactive immunity." The telcos actually have other means of legal indemnification–these Senators moved to protect Bush/Cheney, and, in some cases, themselves.