(1) Just six of them – Elizabeth Warren, Sherrod Brown, Al Franken, Joe Manchin, Claire McCaskill and Vermont independent Bernie Sanders – voted against the procedural cloture motion that ended debate on the bill, though a total of 22 Democrats were against final passage.
(2) The Democrats need 60 votes to achieve "cloture" or avoid a filibuster, and that seems near-impossible.
(3) Passage of the compromise amendment is by no means guaranteed, with a number of those voting for the cloture motion still expected to vote against the bill itself.
(4) Reid will bring a so-called 'motion to proceed' vote on Wednesday followed by a 'cloture' vote to end debate on Friday or Saturday.
(5) Reid will bring a so-called motion to proceed vote on Wednesday followed by a cloture vote to end debate on Friday or Saturday.
(6) It turns out that the threat Reid acted on today was broader than the one defused in July: this one eliminates the 60-vote cloture threshold for executive and judicial nominees; the summer threat only dealt with executive nominees.
(7) After promising to bring the compromise to the floor, majority leader Mitch McConnell opted not to set up a normal cloture vote, choosing instead to use a procedural maneuver known as a “ motion to table ”, in which lawmakers were essentially voting to discard the bill.
(8) Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat and longtime Freedom Act skeptic, brought herself to support the bill during the cloture motion for precisely that reason.
(9) In the end, the procedural motion, known as cloture, passed with the support of all 55 members of the Senate's Democratic caucus, who were joined by 12 of their Republican colleagues.
(10) Even if all four voted with Democrats for the USA Freedom Act, they would need 10 more Republicans to reach the 60 votes needed for cloture.
(11) The overall majority of 68 to 31 in favour of the so-called "cloture" motion to proceed to a gun vote comfortably cleared the 60-vote hurdle needed to prevent a filibuster – the tactic typically employed by Republicans, who are in minority in the Senate.
(12) Nevertheless, it is far from clear that there are enough Republican votes to reach cloture on the USA Freedom Act either.
(13) Two Democrats voted against the cloture vote: Mark Begich of Alaska and Mark Pryor of Arkansas.
(14) The Senate’s rules are notoriously complex and the vote last night was “on cloture on the motion to proceed”, which means it sought to limit debate on a motion to actually reconsider the bill.
(15) Thursday’s cloture vote – to bring debate to a close – happened in the middle of a jam-packed Senate schedule in advance of the Memorial Day recess.
(16) There would have to be a major change of heart from at least one Republican in order to avoid a filibuster or make cloture.
(17) Both cloture votes – on USA Freedom and the Patriot Act extension – could come as early as later on Thursday after an equally close-fought battle to pass trade “fast-track” legislation and few would predict which way they would now go.
(18) Despite attempts by Senator Rand Paul to separate the Syrian authorisation from the wider bill on the grounds that it deserved a separate debate, just 27 senators stood in the way of the cloture motion which allowed Obama to avoid a potentially embarrassing direct vote.
(19) However, this would still require Democrats to vote against the procedural “cloture” motion that is needed to bring debate to a close, and it was not yet clear on Tuesday morning whether all those reluctantly supporting the Iran deal would be prepared to do this and risk being accused of filibustering such an important vote.
(20) This is because cloture motions on both bills to bring debate to a close will take two days to complete, pushing final votes back until at least Saturday.