Blog - Articles Tagged 'Specter'

Sen. Arlen Specter [R, PA] is one of the Republicans most likely to vote with Democrats and help them overcome Republican filibusters on key votes. According to our voting trend analysis (scroll down half page here), he votes with his party, the Republicans, only 48 percent of the time. Not surprisingly, he is facing a very difficult primary race in 2010.

Alexander Bolton for The Hill writes that Specter’s best chance for remaining a U.S. senator after this session likely involves switching parties and running as a Democrat:

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) does not have the fall-back option of running as an independent should he lose his 2010 primary election, giving the senior lawmaker strong incentive to abandon his party this year.

Specter faces an extremely difficult primary race against former Rep. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), the conservative firebrand who lost his bid to oust Specter from his seat in the 2004 GOP primary by a mere 17,000 votes (out of more than a million cast).

Pennsylvania political experts say that Specter would likely face a more difficult challenge in 2010 because the Republican primary electorate in Pennsylvania has become more conservative.

“I think he has a lot of problems,” said Terry Madonna, a professor of political science at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. “I think this is the test of lifetime.”

Madonna estimated that between 150,000 to 200,000 centrist Republicans switched registration to the Democratic Party in the 2008 election cycle, leaving the remaining GOP electorate more conservative.

If he makes the decision to switch, he’ll probably become an even more reliable cross-over for the Democrats and help them pass key bill coming up this year, including card check, health care reform, climate change legislation, and banking regulations.

Some of the key votes that Specter has voted with the Democrats on so far this year include D.C. voting rights, the stimulus bill, S-CHIP and the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.

View Specter’s full voting history, including information on which votes were with his party and which were against his party, and use our head-to-head vote comparison tool to see how he compares to other senators from both parties.

If Al Franken is seated in Minnesota, it looks like Senate Democrats will still be one vote short of breaking an inevitable Republican filibuster of the Employee Free Choice Act. There is only one Senate Republican who might possibly side with the Democrats. Sen. Arlen Specter [R, PA] voted for the bill last year, and he’s on the fence as to whether or not he’ll vote for it again this year. If he does, he’ll likely enable the Democrats to get the bill, which would make it easier for workers to for unions, signed into law.

It just so happens that Sen. Specter is going to be facing a very difficult primary race challenger in 2010, and his best chance at staying a U.S. Senator beyond this session likely involves him switching parties and running as a Democrat. But would Democrats in Pennsylvania Specter over a likely more progressive Democratic primary challenger? Winning full-fledged support from organized labor couldn’t hurt:

This is big: Senior officials with the powerful AFL-CIO have privately assured GOP Senator Arlen Specter that they’ll throw their full support behind him in the 2010 Senate race if he votes for the Employee Free Choice Act, a senior labor strategist working closely with the AFL on the issue tells me.

This is significant, because it represents a big incentive for Specter to switch parties — and to support Employee Free Choice. Specter may be facing a serious GOP primary challenge from Club for Growth head Pat Toomey. If he loses that — or pulls out of the GOP first and becomes an Indy or a Dem — supporting Employee Free Choice could give him the organizational muscle from labor and Democratic support he needs to prevail in a general election and hold his seat.

The labor strategist tells me that top AFL-CIO officials have told Specter they’ll back him to the hilt if he supports their top priority.

“If Senator Specter supports working people — particularly voting with us on Employee Free Choice — the AFL-CIO will support him 100 percent of the way, whether in a primary or a general election,” the strategist says.

Breaking from CongressDaily ($):

Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., will vote against a cloture motion to limit debate on the Employee Free Choice Act, business groups said today. Keith Smith, who directs labor policy at the National Association of Manufacturers, said his group expects Specter to announce his decision in a floor speech early this afternoon. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said it also was expecting the announcement. Specter’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Specter’s opposition could doom the legislation because to pass the bill organized labor needs 60 votes to overcome a Republican filibuster. That means keeping every single Democratic vote, securing a win for Democratic candidate Al Franken in the ongoing Minnesota Senate race and keeping Specter, who voted for cloture when the Senate considered the bill in 2007, on board.

We’ll see what Specter says on the floor, but I assume he’s saying he won’t vote to stop a Republican filibuster. The actual vote on the bill, if Democrats are able to break the filibuster, would only take 51 votes; it wouldn’t actually require any Republican support.

Quick Update: Yup, he’ll vote against cloture (via Greg Sargent):

This is big: Senator Arlen Specter has just confirmed that he’ll vote against cloture for the Employee Free Choice Act, his office confirms to me, potentially dealing a real blow to labor’s efforts to get the key 60 votes for the measure in the Senate.



Specter made the declaration on the floor of the Senate moments ago, his spokesperson confirms.

Update 2: I should note that Specter was the only Republican in the Senate who voted for the Employee Free Choice Act last year, and he was a co-sponsor of the bill in 2004. These facts give us reason to question Specter’s explanation today and imagine that it also had to do with the tough primary challenge he is facing in 2010 from Pat Toomey.

Update 3: Specter posts his full remarks today on EFCA.

Saying that the Republican party has moved too far to the right, Sen. Arlen Specter [R, PA] is switching parties immediately and will run for reelection in 2010 as a Democrat. Huge news:

Specter’s decision would give Democrats a 60 seat filibuster proof majority in the Senate assuming Democrat Al Franken is eventually sworn in as the next senator from Minnesota. (Former senator Norm Coleman is appealing Franken’s victory in the state Supreme Court.) […]

President Obama was informed of Specter’s decision at around 10:25 a.m., according to White House officials, and reached out to the senator minutes later to tell him “you have my full support,” and we are “thrilled to have you.”

Specter as a Democrat would also fundamentally alter the 2010 calculus in Pennsylvania as he was expected to face a difficult primary challenge next year from former Rep. Pat Toomey. The only announced Democrat in the race is former National Constitution Center head Joe Torsella although several other candidates are looking at the race.

The precariousness of Specter’s political position – a Republican in a Democratic-leaning state – was on display earlier this year when he was one of three GOP senators to back President Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus plan. That vote was strongly condemned by conservative Republicans and Toomey used that vote as the launching pad for his candidacy.

Some of the key votes that Specter has voted with the Democrats on so far this year include D.C. voting rights, the stimulus bill, S-CHIP and the the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. Since he will probably be facing a less centrist Democratic challenger in the primary, Specter will likely vote even more often with the Democrats this session, including on issues like health care reform and climate change.

View Specter’s full voting history, including information on which votes were with his party and which were against his party, and use our vote comparison tool to see how he compares to other senators from both parties.

Specter’s decision helps Senate Democrats get to a filibuster-proof 60 seats, but he has already stated that he will not vote with Democrats to overcome a Republican-led filibuster on the hotly contested Employee Free Choice Act.

UPDATE: Some info on the deal worked out between Specter and the Democrats:

Capitol Hill sources tell NBC News there had been active discussion between senior Democratic leadership and Arlen Specter for about three weeks.

NO DEM OPPONENT PROMISED: Specter was promised that the Democratic Party would fully support his candidacy as a Democrat and would not back any other Democrat seeking the seat. “In money and message,” the party will be behind Specter. Any other Democrat who intends to run will “not have the blessing of the party.”

NO CHAIRMANSHIP ON THE TABLE: Sources say Specter will not be given a chairmanship during this Congress, the 111th. For now, “chairmanships were not on the table” as a part of the party switch negotiations.

Making things a little more official seeming, Sen. Arlen Specter [D, PA] today moved his Senate desk from the Republican side of the chamber to the Democratic side. CQ:

As the eighth most senior Democrat, his desk now sits in the second row of the center-most section of the majority party’s desks, behind Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin of Illinois.

Specter now shares a row with Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, the longest-serving senator ever, and sits between Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut and Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, just over Durbin’s right shoulder.

How much does the chit-chat between desk sharers affect what happens in the Senate? Did Durbin lean back in his chair and have a quick word with Arlen after he cast his first vote as a Democrat today against cramdown?

Nate Silver at Five Thirty Eight has been tracking Sen. Arlen Specter’s [D, PA] votes in the Senate since his switch from the Republican party to the Democrats in April.

In the first month or so after becoming a Democrat, Specter was voting with his new party about two-thirds of the time on these Contentious Votes. While there are some less loyal Democrats — say, Ben Nelson of Nebraska — who only vote with their party about half the time, this was certainly less than what most Democratic observers were hoping for.

But since then, indeed, something has changed. Well, a couple of things have changed. On May 27th, Congressman Joe Sestak announced that he intended to challenge Specter for the Democratic nomination. And since that time, Specter has voted with his party on 28 out of 29 Contentious Votes, or 97 percent of the time.

The one vote Specter split from the Democrats on recently was on an amendment from Sen. Jim DeMint [R, SC] “to require the completion of at least 700 miles of reinforced fencing along the southwest border by December 31, 2010.” Twenty other Democrats also voted for that amendment.