Reid is widely reported to be "likely" filing for cloture on Wall Street reform today, meaning the final vote could come sometime Wednesday. The major question, as the bill has been getting incrementally stronger and more progressive, is whether the really substantive, systemic reform amendments will be allowed on the floor and meet the 60 vote threshold. The Hill reports:
The leftward push will underscore tensions in the party that flared last week between Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.).
Dorgan, who has been a persistent critic of derivatives for more than a decade, is pushing hard for a vote on his amendment to ban so-called "naked" credit default swaps. Those are derivatives that are tied to the potential for an asset to default, but in which traders don't have an actual stake in the underlying asset....
The bigger fight, however, will take place over an amendment offered by Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.) to place stronger restrictions on proprietary trading.
The amendment would ban proprietary trading at banks and require the Federal Reserve to impose tougher capital requirements on large non-banks that engage in the same type of trading. Senate aides said the amendment would likely come up for a vote, but they did not say when.
A large coalition of liberal and labor groups have lined up behind the amendment, as have at least 28 Democratic senators, according to Public Citizen.
Wall Street banks oppose the measure, which could cut into their profits significantly....
Lisa Lindsley, director of capital strategies at AFSCME, said the Dorgan proposal is an important complement to the Merkley-Levin amendment.
"The most important thing is to pass the Merkley/Levin amendment to keep banks from having their casino-like practices bring down the whole economy, and we see the issue of naked credit default swaps as part of it," Lindsley said.
The White House is said to support the Merkley-Levin amendment, and it has 28 Dem supporters now, with four more leaning toward supporting it. One detractor, the finance lawyer who writes Economics of Contempt, sees too many holes the big firms could navigate through, but also argues that there can be improvements made in it in conference. Which is why Wall Street is lined up in opposition to Merkley-Levin.
It's also why Republicans are pushing hard for a 60 vote threshold, threatening a filibuster.
Only Sen. Dick Durbin's (D-Ill.) credit-card reform amendment has so far needed 60 votes. The rest have required only a simple majority. The higher requirement is an indication of the high stakes in play for Wall Street.
Levin and Merkley, meanwhile, have been in close negotiations with Sens. Mark Warner (D-Va.), Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) and freshman Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts, sources say. A vote had been possible for Monday evening but looks increasingly less likely to happen until Tuesday or Wednesday, aides said.
One complicating factor is primary day: With elections in Arkansas and Pennsylvania, Levin-Merkley backers Blanche Lincoln and Arlen Specter would have difficulty making the vote. And those are two votes that Levin and Merkley can't afford to lose - especially if they're forced to contend with a supermajority requirement of 60.
Stay tuned....