Barbara Boxer has just offered a motion to table the Nelson amendment that would restrict abortion coverage access. Rather than requiring a 60-vote threshold or subject to a cloture vote, tabling the amendment needs an up or down vote to succeed. Tabling an amendment essentially kills it. Boxer obviously feels confident that she has 51 votes to table.

Voting is happening now.

…Blanche Lincoln voted to table. Everything else is as expected, for now.

…Kent Conrad just voted no on tabling the amendment. So did Byron Dorgan. There’s not a huge margin for error here.

…Mary Landrieu and Mark Begich just voted to table. As did Tim Johnson of South Dakota.

…Jon Tester votes aye. I’m really only mentioning the votes that are in any way in doubt.

…Evan Bayh votes no. That’s four Democratic no votes, by my count (add Ben Nelson)… oh, and Bob Casey, so that’s five.

…Susan Collins votes aye, and you would have to expect Olympia Snowe to follow suit. I think tabling is likely to pass, at this point.

…Joe Lieberman votes aye, along with Olympia Snowe, to table the Nelson amendment.

…Interesting to see the contrasts between the House and Senate. Over 55% of the House voted for the Stupak amendment, But I think we’ll get 56 or 57% of the Senate in the other direction. That’s a function of needing a larger fundraising base, and also a certain fellow in charge of the D-Trip named Rahm Emanuel.

So the Nelson amendment has been tabled by a vote of 54-45. Waiting on a roll call. I’m missing a couple Democrats who voted against tabling.

So the question becomes, what now? Ben Nelson has threatened to filibuster the underlying bill if the abortion language didn’t change. It’s not changing through a standalone amendment, at least. There’s obviously going to have to be more negotiation, as Harry Reid said today:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, “If the Nelson amendment fails, I’m happy to work with him on this. If he doesn’t succeed, I’m happy to work with him on something else.”

Watch for some changes to be slipped into a manager’s amendment, but if there’s anything that goes beyond what Barbara Boxer or some of the pro-choice Democrats support, that will cause further problems. So the answer, like so much in this health care debate, is, who the hell knows?

UPDATE: Rep. Lois Capps, whose language on this issue was essentially preserved by the Senate, emails this response:

“I am pleased that my colleagues in the Senate voted to oppose the restrictive Nelson/Hatch amendment and maintained the current commonsense compromise approach on abortion services in the health insurance reform bill,” said Capps. “This amendment was far too extreme, going well beyond current law to deny private health insurance coverage of abortion services in the U.S. Its adoption would have meant more women would have their reproductive health choices made by politicians and anti-choice zealots in Washington , DC instead of by themselves and their doctors. As I have said time and again – comprehensive health insurance reform legislation is not the place to be re-debating federal abortion policy, nor is it the place to dramatically expand or contract access to abortion services. The Senate’s current approach closely mirrors my language which was originally included in the House bill. This compromise approach ensures that federal funds do not pay for abortions but allows continued access to this legal medical procedure.”

UPDATE II: The other two Democrats to vote against tabling were Ted Kaufman (D-DE) and Mark Pryor (D-AR).

UPDATE III: Here’s Diana DeGette of the Pro-Choice Caucus in the House:

“I am delighted the U.S. Senate has rejected an extreme amendment that would have turned back the clock on a woman’s right to choose. The underlying Senate bill already prohibits federal funding of abortion. The amendment the Senate rejected today was an attempt to use health care reform to restrict women’s access to reproductive health services. Throughout the conference process, pro-choice Members will be working to ensure that health care reform legislation does not restrict abortion rights beyond current law. Over 40 Members of the House have vowed not to support a conference report that further restricts a woman’s right to choose.”

She keeps in everyone’s mind the threat of voting down any bill with Stupak language intact.

UPDATE IV: Nelson was not really definitive in his remarks tonight:

“What happened tonight makes it harder to be supportive. We’ll see what happens,” Nelson said after the vote.

Nelson said he isn’t going to work with Reid on a compromise, “I had no Plan B. I’m not looking for a Plan B, but others may be,” he said, adding, “I always listen to the leader if the leader had something to say.”

I’d say Nelson is a prime candidate to go yes on cloture and no on the final bill, if he is satisfied on other counts.