The Senate Voted on 15 KXL Amendments Last Night. Here's How the Votes Went.

Last night, the Senate voted on fifteen amendments to the Keystone XL pipeline bill (S.1), bringing the total number of amendments voted on so far to twenty-four.

At around 6 PM last night, when the Senate cast its fifteenth roll call vote on an amendment to the Keystone XL bill, Mitch McConnell highlighted the fact that the Senate had just reached a milestone:

“We’ve actually reached a milestone here that I think is noteworthy for the Senate. We just cast our 15th roll call vote on an amendment on this bill, which is more votes — more roll call votes on amendments than the entire United States Senate [did] in all of 2014,” he said.

Republicans and some Democrats had often criticized Harry Reid for "filling the amendment tree" as Majority Leader. This a tactic that Majority Leaders can do, as they have the ability to submit amendments first, to close off the amendment process.

Despite allowing votes on so many amendments, McConnell did not allow debate on them, angering Democrats. You can watch McConnell rudely turning down Democratic requests to talk about their amendments here. The Democrats ask to talk, McConnell and other Republicans object, and the Republicans then move to table the amendment.

I have included all 15 votes from last night below.

Two reminders:

(1) As you probably already know, amendments need 60 votes to pass, so many amendments will fail with fifty-odd votes.

(2) When the Senate votes to "table" an amendment, they are voting to dismiss it. Only a majority of those present is needed here.

---------------------------------------Go to Daily Kos for the rest----------------------------------------------