UPDATE:  Darren Samuelsohn reports in Greenwire and in The New York Times that, despite all the upheaval, the bill is on its way as soon as this afternoon to the EPA for economic analysis that will take about six weeks, which Reid has said will be completed before the Senate floor debate.  I'm also hearing from media reports (including The Boston Globe, USA Today, MSNBC, etc.) and sources closer to the process that progress is being made today, with the Senators getting together again evening to work out differences and the White House engaged in getting the bill off hold.

Ezra Klein has a thoughtful opinion piece on Graham in the Washington Post (You wouldn't like Lindsey Graham when he's angry) that includes a replay of my lunch conversation with a politically astute colleague.  After volleying ideas back and forth, we concluded that Graham is basically in the right here.  There's no reason to believe that the Senate could handle both immigration and climate this year, and it makes more sense politically, and because of the nature of the problem (admittedly we're both climate and energy policy wonks and don't know much about immigration laws), to go ahead first with climate and energy this year.  Or, as Ezra puts it, more eloquently: 

Graham is right on the merits: Moving a climate change bill this year is more important than moving an immigration bill. There's a point-of-no-return on climate change: If you don't start getting carbon emissions down in the near future, it'll be too late. Immigration, conversely, is bad, but it's not getting dramatically worse or harder to fix with each passing month...Graham, who wants the Democratic leadership and the White House to stick to the original plan and move a more important bill with a better chance of passage, is not only right to be annoyed, but as far I can tell, is actually right.

All that said, this conflict seems premised on the Senate's presumed inability to do two hard things at once. Lots of people agree that the Senate cannot focus on two big fights at once, but it's never been entirely clear why that's true.

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After a contentious weekend on the climate legislation front, with major news outlets declaring the deal dead or on respirator support, can the climate bill be saved?  Or has the fragile momentum been lost? 

Sponsors John Kerry, Lindsay Graham, and Joe Lieberman planned the much anticipated release of their climate and energy bill today, April 26, fast on the heels of Earth Day glow.  Negotiations over oil & gas sections of the bill reportedly held it up over past weeks (Jesse Jenkins, Senate Climate Bill Trio Scrapping Oil and Gasoline Fee?).

The 2010 window of opportunity for passing climate and energy legislation was already small and the likelihood of getting to 60 votes tenuous.  The "lost weekend" could be the nail in the coffin. 

As a realist with an optimistic streak, I can't help but hope that it isn't a lost cause.  But my reading of the politics tells me it likely will be, at least for this year.  We will know much more within a few days, once the Obama Administration, which has been pretty quiet about all of this, responds, and once talks between Kerry, Graham, Lieberman, and Senate Majority Leader Reid either resolve or dissolve.  But this weekend's hostility and announcements are likely to make it even harder to cobble together 60 yea votes should the deal be pulled back on track.

The sad facts of the "lost weekend" were widely reported.  Lindsay Graham pulled support for the major Senate climate bill over disagreement about Democrats' handling of immigration, as the New York Times' John Broder published up top on the front online page Saturday afternoon:

"In a move that may derail a comprehensive climate change and energy bill in the Senate, one of the measure’s central architects, Senator Lindsey Graham, has issued an angry protest over what he says are Democratic plans to give priority to a debate over immigration policy."

Bloggers at The Energy Collective have written about the stunning development, including posts by lead blogger Dan Yurman (Climate bill postponed), Joe Romm (Breaking: Sen. Graham threatens to halt work on climate and energy bill over immigration plans), and Matt Dernoga (Update: Graham Withdraws Support for Climate Legislation).

What's next?  Will Obama and his top advisors step in and somehow make this right?  Will Graham reconsider pulling his support?  Co-sponsors John Kerry and Joe Lieberman are at the center of negotiations to bring the bill back to the table and ready for a release ASAP.  But for now, the release of the legislation is "indefinitely postponed."

As reported in this morning's E&E Daily (subs. req.): 

The Senate climate bill sits on the brink of collapse today after the lead Republican ally threatened to abandon negotiations because of a White House push to simultaneously overhaul the nation's immigration policies...

...Graham promised to leave President Obama and Senate Democrats standing at the altar after they started pushing last week for a comprehensive immigration reform bill...Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) tried to intervene Saturday during a phone call with Graham...Hours later, Graham's two partners on the climate effort, Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), hastily scrapped plans to release the bill today during a press conference with top business, religious and military officials.

With the rhetoric rising, senators and staff scrambled all through the weekend to save the climate measure. Environmentalists also raised their own voice challenging Reid and Obama to do a better job managing the agenda this year if their signature issue is to have any chance of notching the 60 votes necessary to make it to a conference with the House-passed global warming bill.

In an interview Sunday, Lieberman said he, Graham and Kerry plan to meet again today to map out strategy for their legislation, including outreach to the environmentalists and business officials who they have been in closed-door talks with over the last several months.

Graham technically remains at the bargaining table..."Lindsey couldn't have been stronger this morning about his commitment to going forward on this bill," Lieberman said. "But he needs it to be separated from immigration reform because he thinks that's necessary if we're going to have a real chance to get it adopted."... According to Lieberman, Reid said he assumed the Senate would first move onto the energy and climate bill because it was further along in the legislative process compared with immigration, which has not even emerged in draft form.

"We honestly believe this bill is going forward," a Kerry aide said yesterday. "The political landscape is still well-poised to get us the bipartisan support we need once the bill goes to the floor. The business and environment coalition is there and continuing to stand by us."

Rebecca Lutzy is the Content and Community Manager at The Energy Collective and a Ph.D. student at Princeton University focused on U.S. climate and energy policy.