It's just plain dumb.

Oh wait, you had noticed that the GOP leadership held the vote open four hours in another case while they pressured and bribed Congressmen on the floor to vote for a Medicare Drug package.

Spare me the faux partisan outrage.

By the way, the vote was held open and it finally was resolved and the Democrats won. McNulty even apologized for misreading the vote earlier. We are still waiting for apologies for the last few years of GOP misrule.

Or it could be that somebody was planning on changing their vote from "No" to "Yes", but McNulty closed the vote as 214-214 before the vote was changed, and the Republicans are in fact arguing that it should have been counted anyway. I can't play the youtube video, so can someone tell me if it's got the details?

Michael, I think your point two is wrong - I had understood the incident (and maybe it's me who's got it wrong) as being that votes were allowed after the gavel came down, not that there was confusion about votes cast before the gavel dropped.

215 + 213 = 428
214 + 214 = 428

Since they were both in agreement about the total number of votes counted, that argument wouldn't make sense. It sounded more like one (or more) votes were counted as a "No" by the Democrats, but as a "Yes" by the Republicans. Unless those numbers are wrong, if it was 214-213 instead of 215-213, then I can see where an late "No" vote would cause the argument.

The video shows the acting speaker saying, essentially, that they mistakenly gaveled the tally while people were still voting.

Ok, that still doesn't explain why both sides are claiming the same total number of votes. Unless one (or more) people who had not yet cast their vote were recorded as voting either "Yes" or "No", depend on which side of the isle you were listening from. Was there an under-vote, or misrepresented votes, and in who's count?

it is merely asserted that it happened, not established

Right. The video shows the acting speaker saying, essentially, that they mistakenly gaveled the tally while people were still voting.

"Ugh"'s comment at 9:04 is distressingly ignorant in its assertion that "once passed [last night], this bill immediately became the law of the land." I seem to remember the Constitution envisioning a role for the Senate and the President in bills becoming the law of the land.

I gather he was being sardonic.

With that said, however, I should add that at the moment, it is merely asserted that it happened, not established. The video posted supposedly "of the events" does nothing to establish what took place. What's driven this story thusfar is the accounts of Representatives and staffers (on both sides), who surely shouldn't be considered a disinterested (and thus reliable) source. But there is a reliable source: the whole thing was carried live, on CSPAN. I want to see the unedited video posted to youtube, not just a snippet.

"Ugh"'s comment at 9:04 is distressingly ignorant in its assertion that "once passed [last night], this bill immediately became the law of the land." I seem to remember the Constitution envisioning a role for the Senate and the President in bills becoming the law of the land.

“have you noticed these things seem to happen late at night? It seems like calmer heads always lose out in these extended sessions.”

Sundowning

1.) A vote was cast, sometime before and leading up to 11pm.

2.) After the vote was gaveled closed, the Majority party believed the vote was 214-214, while the Minority party believed the vote was 215-213. Nobody is saying why there was this confusion, wasn't somebody counting? Can we get a C-SPAN instant replay?

3.) Because of the disagreement, Majority leader Hoyer offered a re-vote, instead of just making official what his Majority party believed should be official. If nobody was keeping count the first time, I can't think of any other way to resolve it.

4.) Republicans don't want the re-vote, I can only assume they want their belief that the vote was 215-213 made official, so they walk out.

5.) With disagreement about the actual outcome of the vote, and Republicans refusing a re-vote, and I assume not enough reps left for quorum, the House didn't record any outcome of the vote in the official record. What other choice was there, really?