Before the DADT repeal vote on Saturday, the Senate will take up the DREAM Act. Both votes came up as a House amendment to a Senate amendment to a bill, so they only require one cloture vote, a motion to concur. If they invoke cloture with 60 votes, they would only need a simple majority after that, and Harry Reid will fill the amendment tree on the measures, so if something passes, it would look identical to what the House passed. With Senators Bennett and Lugar in the bag, a unified caucus would mean 60 votes. But given the nature of how the vote is being brought up, I think the overwhelmingly likely outcome is that it fails tomorrow.

Liveblogging of the Senate Banking Committee hearing on foreclosure fraud continues. Senator Richard Shelby was actually pretty good, but then Sens. Mike Johanns and Bob Bennett went to some length to try to pretend the banksters weren’t doing what they were doing.

This hearing is the latest example of national policymakers getting involved in the foreclosure fraud issue. The Congressional Oversight Panel warning of the enormous risk from the failures of servicers was the first report of its kind at the federal level to take full measure of the situation, and this is the first Congressional hearing. Senators on the Democratic side like Jeff Merkley and Sherrod Brown are sure to press the bank representatives aggressively on why foreclosure mitigation programs have failed, and why they used false documents to evict people from their homes. The ranking member on the Republican side, Richard Shelby, wants to investigate failures at the major loan servicers.

The defense authorization bill faces peril on its motion to proceed. That would render moot the vote on the DREAM Act, which would allow undocumented students brought to America by their parents a path to citizenship if they complete college or military service. Harry Reid has promised a vote on the DREAM Act as an amendment to the defense bill, but if work cannot begin on that bill, presumably the DREAM Act loses its opportunity.

That said, if the motion to proceed does succeed, several Democrats will have a choice to make. . . .

Senator George LeMieux (R-FL) is starting to feel the heat of pro-migrant voters, specifically Latino voters. Saturday, Univision aired a debate in which current Florida governor and U.S. Senate nominee Charlie Crist came out in support of the DREAM Act. Thursday, Representative Kendrick Meek (D-FL), and also a nominee for U.S. Senate, hand delivered a letter to LeMieux.

We can only hope that Oregon’s Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden’s recent shift away from the individual mandate is a sign that the Democratic Party is beginning to acknowledge what a massive political and policy mistake they made.

This is not a great time to be a Republican establishment candidate for Senate–even if you’re already a Senator. Voters are dissing old-school officeholders in favor of insurgents whose allegiances rhyme with “me.”

There is a meme that the Republican Party has a top-down, authoritarian structure where potential candidates patiently wait their turn for nominations. On the other hand, the Democratic Party hosts a divided, disorganized coalition. Yet this year, it’s the GOP that is seeing a roiling, rebellious bottom-up movement with little deference to leadership.

Sure, the big news out of Utah today was that Senator Bob Bennett’s career ended at the hand of the GOP invasion by teabaggers, but across town, US House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer couldn’t convince Democrats to spare their Blue Dog anti-HCR-vote Congressman, Jim Matheson, a primary.

Coming in third at his state’s Republican Party convention, Utah Republican Senator Bob Bennett has lost his chance at his party’s nomination and is too late to file as an independent candidate. His career as a U.S. Senator is effectively over.