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The latest reports out of Albany and the current GOP conference on marriage equality taking place in the New York State House reveal that the state's Senate might be days away from voting on the "issue." Details follow.
According to Capital Tonight's just-updated Twitter feed:
"Just informed by a GOP senator that this stalemate situation could go til Wed and maybe Thurs. That's a lot of hymns."
The good news: Updates have been giving polar-opposite reports all day as the situation changes by the minute.
The bad news: The anti-gay GOP seems hellbent on stalemating marriage equality for this session of the legislation calendar.
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And earlier:
According to the NY Post, weekend negotiations on religious exemptions in the state's Marriage Equality Act have helped GOP lawmakers in Albany near closer to a deal and therefore a vote on equality.
Reports the Post:
Negotiators for the Republican-run Senate privately admitted that a deal is near after aides spent the Father's Day weekend ironing out language to appease "religious liberty" concerns that have been raised by several fence-sitting GOP senators.
And public pressure has reached a tipping point, as about 200 supporters of the bill held two raucous rallies near Union Square yesterday.
A vote on New York's Marriage Equality Act could come as early as today, though Gov. Cuomo is expected to keep lawmakers in session through the end of the week to vote on a number of undecided-yet-pressing bills.
Joe Jervis also points us to Greg Sargent's optimistic Washington Post editorial:
A historic day for marriage equality? The most important thing to watch today: New York’s state legislature is on the verge of voting to become the sixth state to legalize gay marriage. Proponents are one vote in the state senate short of making today a very big day indeed for marriage equality. The larger story is striking: This year, for the first time, multiple national polls are showing majority support for the notion that consenting gay adults should have the right to marry and enjoy the same benefits of marriage that heterosexual couples do. If New York takes this step today — which would make it the largest state thus far to do so — it will reinforce the sense that the national outcome of this decades-long civil-rights battle, which has produced a truly astonishing shift in public attitudes, is inevitable.
In critical timing news, New York City Pride week starts today...
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