Reid Files for Cloture on Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal

From The Washington Blade:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) tonight filed cloture on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal legislation for a possible vote in the Senate on Saturday.

Regan Lachappelle, a Reid spokesperson, said the Senate no longer plans take up omnibus legislation to fund the government as originally planned and will instead proceed to “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” and the DREAM Act, an immigration-related bill.

“The first vote will be on cloture on the DREAM Act on Saturday,” Lachapelle said. “If that fails we would move to the cloture vote on “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.”

According to Talking Points Memo, it looks like Harry Reid has the votes on DADT.

Proponents of repealing the military's ban on openly gay servicemembers have enough votes in the Senate to get it done this year. The only thing standing in the way of ending Don't Ask, Don't Tell now is time.

Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) is backing the standalone Don't Ask, Don't Tell bill in the Senate, his office confirms to TPM. So is Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK). The pair join Republican Sens. Susan Collins (ME) and Olympia Snowe (ME) in publicly supporting the measure, giving it more than enough votes to secure the 60 needed for cloture, the first step before a final vote that would almost assuredly come down on the side of repeal.

Vote counts, of course, can change by the time a vote is actually taken -- any Democrat counting on the support of the Maine Republicans knows that. That said, supporters of equality within the armed forces may finally be seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, which couldn't come soon enough considering that light would be shut off by the Republicans come the start of the new Congress in early January.