Byrd's Death Sets Back Financial Reform

Robert Byrd is dead, and the financial reform bill might not be far behind. Byrd’s demise comes just days after the Senate and House had hammered out a final version of the legislation, and dashes hopes that it could be voted on this week. West Virginia’s Democratic governor will almost certainly select a Democrat to fill Byrd’s seat, but that’s unlikely to happen before the Fourth of July recess.

Byrd didn’t vote on the Senate’s original version of Dodd-Frank, but that vote is more crucial now, because Scott Brown and Susan Collins, two of four Republicans to back the bill, are upset about the last-minute addition of a $19 billion tax on big banks. “I cannot support any bill that raises taxes,” Brown told the LA Times yesterday, while Collins simply said she was “taking a look” at it. Without them, one analyst says, "Democrats are going to have to go back and count noses." (More financial reform stories.)