Senate passes human trafficking bill, making way for Loretta Lynch confirmation vote

Get ready for lots of huzzahs and back-patting from the Senate, all because they did their damned job for once. They passed a bill, the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act, 99-0 after hammering out a deal that still includes anti-abortion restrictions but does not do the really bad thing of putting the Hyde amendment restrictions onto money that's not appropriated by Congress. This means the Senate can do its damned job on the next thing, confirming Loretta Lynch to be attorney general. That vote is expected Thursday morning.

Democrats tried to get abortion language out but failed.

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) urged his colleagues to remove “the divisive language that limits victims services and has held us up for so long."

"Congress has a long history of passing legislation to address human trafficking," he said. "We've consistently done so without abortion politics being in the discussion."

But Leahy was ultimately unsuccessful, with Democratic Sens. Bob Casey (Pa.), Joe Donnelly (Ind.) and Joe Manchin (W.Va.) voting against him.

A number of poison pill amendments were turned back, including ones from Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) on immigration. Vitter's was particularly vile (and stupid). He wanted to amend the Constitution to do away with birthright citizenship in order to, he said, eliminate birth tourism. Since the Constitution can't be amended with a Senate floor vote, he didn't get his way.

While the Republican leadership is busy patting themselves on the back for a doing such a great "bipartisan" thing, just their second substantive legislative accomplishment in four months, they can now finally move to rectify the their most embarrassing performance since gaining the majority: making Loretta Lynch wait five months for a vote. Not that they couldn't have done that any time since January, they just wanted to drag it out because they could.