AFP is reporting that the issue of whether an interim appointment will be made to Edward Kennedy’s Senate seat will be taken up by Massachusetts lawmakers in early September.
A legislative aide of the state’s committee on election law told AFP the hearing will be held within a week of Labor Day, and that every member of the state’s House and Senate would attend.
CNN, citing unnamed “Massachusetts political sources,” also reported moments ago that state lawmakers plan to hear the bill in “just a week and a half.”
It used to fall to Massachusetts’ governor to appoint an interim senator, though Democrats changed state law in 2004 in fear that Mitt Romney would nominate a Republican to the Senate if John Kerry was elected president. Now a special election must be held several months after a Senate vacancy is created.
Kennedy asked just days before his death that state law be changed to allow a temporary appointment so Democratic initiatives in the Senate — notably health care reform — would not be negatively affected by his death.
There’s been much speculation that Kennedy’s wife might be interested in an interim appointment — an idea endorsed over the weekend by Chris Dodd and Orrin Hatch — though George Stephanopoulos, citing a “solid source,” says she’s not interested.
