Counting the Votes for Syria

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed a resolution this afternoon to authorize the use of U.S. military force against Syria. The resolution will be voted on by the full Senate next week, but since before this afternoon’s committee decision, politicians and commentators have been trying to read the tea leaves on how the vote will go. And unlike on so many other issues, this vote probably will not follow party lines.

Whip counts by the Washington Post, Think Progress, CNN, and others have been shifting over the past day or so. The Post, for instance, moved Sen. John McCain from their “Against military action” column (he’d been placed there for saying earlier in the week that he didn’t support the president’s plan as proposed) to “For military action” after his SFRC vote this afternoon. Still, all the tallies so far leave about 300 of the House’s 435 members unaccounted for, making them only modestly instructive.

The 10-7 committee vote this afternoon, however, may be a preview of next week’s vote. Interventionism makes for strange bedfellows: McCain and fellow Republicans Bob Corker and Jeff Flake joined seven Democrats in support of the resolution, while Democrats Tom Udall and Christopher Murphy voted against it along with Republicans Marco Rubio and Rand Paul. Democrat Edward Markey of Massachusetts voted “present.”

The latest — but still early — forecasts for the full Senate show signs of a similar split. This was the Post‘s count as of this afternoon:

The coalition between the interventionist wings of the Republican and Democratic Parties stands in sharp contrast with what occurred in the British Parliament’s vote last week. On August 29, the House of Commons split nearly along party lines: The entire Labour Party stuck together, as did much of the governing coalition of the Conservative and Liberal Democratic parties. But a handful of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats voted against the motion — and the efforts of their prime minister — sinking David Cameron’s proposal for a British role in a Syrian intervention, 272-285.

The vote next week will likely involve a greater commingling of political parties than in Britain. But, in keeping with the parliamentary outcome, whether or not President Obama’s proposed strikes move forward will probably be decided by a very narrow margin.