let s go to kate bolduan at the white house right now. kate? reporter: this is a very big moment for this white house. we often say that to be honest when big pieces of legislation pass or we overcome a filibuster or the president overcomes a filibuster or something like that. but this is a big moment for the white house and this president and here s why, because the president has vowed since and promised since way back on the presidential campaign trail, this is one of his top priorities, repealing the military s don t ask, don t tell policy. since then, it s become a point of tension, especially with the gay community, many thinking the president turned a blind eye to this very big issue to them. today, the president is kind of making good on that promise, if you will. and we re waiting for new reaction from the white house at this moment to this vote. the final passage of the repeal. but in a statement earlier after the procedural vote, the president laid it out and i m sure his s
fruition, we wouldn t have this problem right now. i know that texas is one of the states where you are right now that was considering, among the 18 states that might have similar laws. now we don t expect that any of them actually will until this is all resolved, but what is the attitude in texas that you re facing? well, there are a couple of reps that are looking at filing legislation for this. i don t believe they will be successful. our governor, of course, has said that he doesn t believe in what s going on there and i am almost positive that our representatives will do everything in their power to not let this legislation pass. okay, margaret moran from lulac, thanks for joining us from san antonio. up next here, no deal yet for charlie rangel. unless he settles, he ll have to face a congressional ethics trial in the midst of the
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the ball really all is in the democrats court now. should they pack up their bags and head home for an early easter break, maybe? the republicans want to continue trying to work on the message. they ve been extraordinarily disciplined. you see any television appearance, they are all singing from the same hymnal. that s important to them because they need to share this debate. in addition, if it does pass, and all the various pieces will fall on legislation pass, they want to have laid the ground work to have this be the central issue, so the democrats will say, we passed it, it s good, and the republicans will continue to say the democrats made a bad decision. you talked about the phone calls the president is going to be making, has been making, you know, to try to close the sale. talk to me about what he s going to say, because this is a real political risk for some of these
down, it s not going to work. here s the problem it creates. unless you have a great depression like when hoover left office or in the 1960s when they could really run up the vote, you re never going to have a truly governing majority in the congress. therefore, nothing is ever going to get done under the 60-senate vote rule. jean? or you need a situation like in 1996 when president clinton wanted to rack up some wins and republicans in congress had given up on bob dole as a presidential candidate and then you saw big pieces of legislation pass and you have the limited windows where it s in both parties interest to actually get something done. we have a two-party system and the public hates to give power to one party. but the rules say you have to give so much power to one party or nothing will get done. we re in a real log jam here. it is a log jam, chris. ultimately, this cannot be a