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SLDN in The Advocate: Levin, Lieberman, Murphy Still Weighing Options for Repeal This Year
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Posted on Advocate.com May 14, 2010 06:08:32 PM
Levin Gives DADT A Lifeline
As the clock ticks, Senator Levin and his colleagues continue to search for a legislative compromise that will allow "don't ask, don't tell" repeal to pass this year.
By Kerry Eleveld
“Don’t ask, don’t tell” repeal advocates said Friday that a vote in the Senate Armed Services Committee remained possible even as the window dwindles down to a matter of days and the White House remains on the sidelines.
“We are working toward and heading for votes within House and Senate in the next weeks and that’s where our resources are focused,” said David Smith, vice president of programs for the Human Rights Campaign.
Advocates met last Friday with Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC), last Friday and have had ongoing conversations with other offices, including that of Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, sponsor of the Senate’s repeal bill.
Levin and Lieberman have been lobbying their SASC colleagues member to member on several repeal options in order to piece together the 15 votes that would allow them to attach the measure in committee to the Department of Defense authorization bill. The SASC is scheduled to pound out final language of the Defense funding bill and vote on it during a closed-door session the week of May 24.
A spokesperson for Levin’s office said the senator would attach repeal language if he drummed up enough support in the committee.
“If he has the votes, he would support moving forward with an amendment during the markup,” Tara Andringa said. “He does not yet know what that would look like or where the votes are.”
Alex Nicholson, executive director of gay veterans group Servicemembers United, said he was more optimistic about the chances than he had been in recent months.
“For the first time in a long time I think that we have a realistic, politically viable path to repeal right now,” he said. “It will depend on what kind of buy in we get from key members on the committee and from the White House."
Despite Secretary of Defense Robert Gates urging Congress not to vote on repeal this year, Levin has pushed forward with the effort. “The president says he wants to repeal ‘Don’t ask.’ Why shouldn’t we repeal it?” Levin told Congressional Quarterly earlier this week.
Though Gates’s objections have posed a challenge to swaying a handful of legislators on the committee, one person with knowledge of the matter said they were on the verge of securing the final votes.
“We’re very close -- within one or two votes – and we feel optimistic about that,” said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Advocates were reticent to discuss details of the different options that are being presented, but several indicated that a moratorium had been taken off the table for now and that full repeal was central to every potentiality.
“I would characterize all options under consideration -- the only thing the community is pushing and blessing -- is full repeal,” Nicholson said. “The only differences are how long it might take to take effect.”
Aubrey Sarvis, executive director of Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, said Levin, Lieberman and Rep. Patrick Murphy of Pennsylvania, chief sponsor of the House repeal bill, were searching for a compromise that would please the triumvirate of the White House, the Department of Defense, and their fellow legislators on the Hill.
“Chairman Levin along with senator Lieberman and representative Murphy are still actively looking at legislative options for repeal this year and would like to find a solution that Secretary Gates and the White House could support.”
Several advocates characterized senator Levin as a hero in the effort.
“We would not still be alive today without the chairman's leadership,” Sarvis said, “and frankly, some in the executive have been surprised by chairmen Levin’s commitment and his continuing sustained determination to find a winning vote in his committee.”
Throughout the efforts, the White House has continued to remain in the background.
A second source who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the White House was partially in a bind based on an agreement White House officials had made with Defense Department officials earlier this year to let the Pentagon’s working group study reach completion before pushing for a repeal vote.
The source, who had knowledge of the meeting, said discussions around “the process” began in December and were finalized in January, when prospects for the administration’s main agenda items such as health care reform were still looking grim.
The White House did not immediately respond to an inquiry for this article.
Secretary Gates has repeatedly said he does not support Congress taking legislative action prior to completion of the Pentagon study.
“I do not recommend a change in the law before we have completed our study,” he said during a March briefing at the Pentagon.
Asked whether the White House agreed with his position, Gates added, “You would have to ask them, but I would tell you that my impression is that the president is very comfortable with the process that we've laid out.”
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs has repeatedly declined to say whether the president favors legislative action this year.
But during an April briefing he said the president was committed to letting the working group complete its study.
“The President has set forward a process with the Joint -- the Chair of the Joint Chiefs and with the Secretary of Defense to work through this issue,” he said.
Pressed on whether that study would have to be completed before legislative action was taken, Gibbs added, “Well, again — the House and the Senate are obviously a different branch of government. The president has a process and a proposal I think that he believes is the best way forward to seeing, again, the commitment that he's made for many years in trying to — changing that law.”
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