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Obama Won’t Have 60 Senators to Back Him Up
by Tom Hess
President-elect Barack Obama will begin his term in January with a solid majority in both the House and Senate to enact his legislative priorities, but he won’t have enough Democrats in the Senate to silence Republican dissent. That’s because Democrats did not win the races they needed for a 60-seat majority, which would have allowed Majority Leader Harry Reid to invoke “cloture” and end a Republican filibuster.
To reach 60, the Democrats needed victories in Georgia and Kentucky. They didn’t get them. Republican incumbents Saxby Chambliss and Mitch McConnell won re-election, and Norm Coleman of Minnesota narrowly led profane comedian Al Franken, with 63 percent of precincts reporting.
With no more than 57 senators — one of them McCain ally Joe Lieberman — the Democrats can’t count on support for their Left-leaning initiatives. And Ben Nelson of Nebraska, a conservative Democrat, shares many of the perspectives of values voters.
Combined with the likely approval of three marriage amendments, the Senate results give values voters reason to stay tuned to developments on Capitol Hill. Watch for legislative alerts from CitizenLink throughout Obama’s first year in office.