Twelve Senate Republicans voted Tuesday for final approval of a bill that would protect same-s*x marriages at the federal level. This meant that the bill got more than the 60 votes it needed to pass.
Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Rob Portman (Ohio), Thom Tillis (North Carolina), Mitt Romney (Utah), Roy Blunt (Mo. ), Cynthia Lummis (Wyo. ), Richard Burr (North Carolina), Shelley Moore Capito (West Virginia), Dan Sullivan (Alaska), Joni Ernst (Iowa), and Todd Young (Iowa) all voted for the bill (Ind.).
The GOP senators’ support wasn’t a surprise, since they had all voted in favor of moving the bill forward in recent votes. The bill will now go back to the House, which had already passed a similar version. Collins, Portman, and Tillis, three Republicans who backed the bill, were the main people in charge of talks.
The five-person group, which also included Democratic Sens. Tammy Baldwin (Wis.) and Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.), put the bill off until after the midterm elections to increase its chances of passing. They also added provisions to address some Republicans’ concerns about religious freedom.
“Tonight, the Senate passed the Respect for Marriage Act that @SenatorBaldwin and I wrote to help stop discrimination, promote equality, and protect the rights of all Americans,” Collins wrote on Twitter. “Our bill would help make sure that everyone is respected and treated with dignity.”
.@RealBenCarson is right. He said, “Conservatives should be standing even more stalwart in defense of religious liberty — not joining the far Left to use the heavy hand of the federal government to further erode religious liberty.” https://t.co/3XzArUEh6F
— Franklin Graham (@Franklin_Graham) December 1, 2022
Blunt, who had said in public that he wanted the delay, voted for the bill because it added protections for religious freedom. This year, Blunt, Portman, and Burr did not run for re-election, and they will leave the upper chamber in January. Some Republicans, like Lummis, who voted for the bill said they did so even though they didn’t agree with gay marriage.
“Wyoming is the Equality State, and while I firmly believe marriage is a sacred union between one man and one woman, I respect that others hold different beliefs,” Lummis said in a statement, citing the constitution of her state. “While I firmly believe marriage is a sacred union between one man and one woman, I respect that others hold different beliefs.”
After the Mormon church made the announcement that it supported the law, Mitt Romney, who earlier in the fall was still unsure on the issue, similarly stated backing for the legislation. Romney has been an active member of the church for a significant amount of time. Obama holds a rally in support of Warnock just before the high-stakes election. Georgia Senate runoff In response to a court order, Cochise County in Arizona has certified the election results.
“Although I support the institution of conventional marriage, the ruling in Obergefell is and always has been the law of the land on which members of the LGBTQ community have relied. In a statement released after an earlier vote to advance the law, Mitt Romney said, “This legislation brings certainty to many LGBTQ Americans, and it indicates that Congress — and I — esteem and love all of our fellow Americans equally.”
With the exception of Senator Raphael Warnock, who was absent from Tuesday’s vote in order to campaign for the forthcoming runoff election in Georgia, every Democrat in the Senate voted in favor of the proposal. In addition to Senator Ben Sasse, retiring Republican Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, who had previously opposed holding a procedural vote on the bill, did not attend the vote (R-Neb.).
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