UPDATE: My predictions were both right and wrong. S1 has just passed the New Jersey Senate by a vote of 24 – 16. Republican Senators Diane Allen and Jennifer Beck both voted ‘Yes’ on the bill.
The Assembly is expected to take up A1 during Thursday’s voting session.
Notable? A solid margin but not veto proof (would’ve needed 2/3, or 27 votes). Hence, S1 cannot survive the Governor’s expected veto…
ORIGINAL POST – 11:41 AM
We knew it was coming, and apparently today is the day. The New Jersey State Senate will be voting on the gay marriage bill once again.
If you can remember way back to 2009, the Democrats in the Senate, mostly those from the north, put forth a very similar bill to the one we have today, which you can read here. Back then, many Democrats were not so keen on passing a marriage equality bill. So many abstained from voting that the bill could not achieve the 21 votes necessary for passage.
In the initial vote all Republican Senators vote against the bill except for Senator Bill Baroni, formerly of the 14th district. Baroni now works at the Port Authority and has been replaced by Democrat Linda Greenstein.
Back in 2009, 3 Democrats, Sweeney, Sarlo, and Beach, all abstained from voting. Dana Redd had just resigned from the Senate to become the Mayor of Camden, and Donald Norcross had not yet assumed her seat. All four are expected to vote today in favor of the bill today. That brings the total ‘Yes’ vote to 18 if the vote were to remain the same today. The wildcards in this process are going to be the Democrats who voted ‘No’ in 2009 (6 in total), and Republican Senator Diane Allen.
Allen was absent in 2009 due to her battle with cancer and has since returned. Some gay marriage advocates I know consider her an ally, but cannot be sure if she would go against Governor Christie on this issue and vote for the bill. Senator Beck, who voted ‘No’ last time, is described by the National Organization for Marriage as a flip-flopper on this issue who will vote for the bill and vote to override the eventual veto from Governor Christie. In fact, she is a co-sponsor of S1.
If NOM and my source are correct, then the split would be 19 ‘Yes’ votes, still short of 21. But is S1 likely to pass? You bet it is.
The Democrats may have been throwing a bone to Garden State Equality and gay activists in 2009, showing support from the leadership and playing a political card, but the failures vote proved to be a political miscalculation instead. The Democrats would not bring this bill up for a vote today unless they knew that they had the votes, and thats the bottom line.
The Wall Street Journal has reported that the Assembly is nearing a veto-proof majority in favor of A1 (S1’s little sister). If the Democrats have been working over Republicans in the Assembly, which they must have to beat the veto pen, you can bet that they have pulled some Republicans in the Senate as well, or at the very least, have gotten anti-gay Democrats in the south like Senator Jeff Van Drew and Senator Fred Madden to jump on board. The will, at least by noon, have picked up the two votes they need.
According to Garden State Equality’s leader, Steven Goldstein, the vote today will take place during the noon voting session, and will be one of the earlier votes.
Mr. Goldstein is likely to get his wish. Expect the bill to pass with exactly 21 votes.
Not to state the obvious, but 24 is not veto-proof. Even if the WSJ got it right on the assembly, it has to be veto-proof in both houses.
S1/A1 were DOA.
Big time kudos to Sens Beck and Allen. This was the right thing to do. Slowly but surely, Republicans like them help the party break away from a Bronze Age mentality and keep me from turning in my membership card.
I thought you already resigned?
Sad day for the rule of law.
Who voted for and against this bill?
Two Republicans voted YEA (Allen & Beck) and two Democrats voted NAY (Jeff Van Drew & Ron Rice).
Wow, Van Drew, I'm surprised Sarlo voted for it he didn't last time.
I'd be curious to learn how Save Jersey's readership breaks down on this topic.
Id be curious to see the break down for blue jersey, too
I'd be willing to bet that the breakdown on Blue Jersey is more homogeneous than that of this site.
Sorry I won't make puns anymore.
I don't think so, Hank. In my own experience/analysis, for every 1 Republican/Republican leaning "civilian" (read non-elected officials) who crossed over to support gay marriage issues, 1.3 Democrat/Democrat leaning civilians were against it (yes, I did some number crunching).