A much-awaited vote to legalise same-sex unions has been postponed by the Senate until after this November’s midterm elections.
Following weeks of bipartisan discussion during which some Republicans voiced concerns about the act’s possible effects on religious liberty, legislators revealed the announcement on Thursday.
The Respect for Marriage Act bill is an amendment to the House version that was approved earlier in July.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin is directing it (D-Wisconsin). and Susan Collins (R-Maine), who are working across party lines to secure the legislation’s necessary 10 GOP Senate votes.
Despite saying she needs “a little more time,” Baldwin told reporters on Thursday that she is “quite hopeful” the bill will pass.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin), one Republican who has indicated the necessity for legislative safeguards for religious liberty, is among them.
In an interview last week, Johnson said that “there are some very genuine worries about religious liberty, and those issues would have to be appropriately handled.”
In a statement in July, Johnson referred to the measure as “unnecessary,” but added that he had “no reason to reject it.”
In the House in July, a record-high 47 Republicans voted with Democrats to support the measure.
The measure would abolish the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which allowed states to refuse to recognise same-sex weddings that took place in other states and defined marriage in federal law as the union of a man and a woman.
However, DOMA was already essentially repealed when the Supreme Court upheld same-sex marriage rights in the rulings United States v. Windsor and Obergefell v. Hodges from 2013 and 2015, respectively.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Democrats have advocated for the legislation. In his concurring statement, Justice Clarence Thomas urged the court to revisit all “substantive due process” decisions, including the Obergefell ruling that allowed same-sex unions in 2015.