WASHINGTON DC — Faced with insufficient support for a measure to completely ban both therapeutic and reproductive cloning in the US, Senator Sam Brownback (Republican) will consider advancing a two-year moratorium on cloning rather than seeking a complete ban, a spokesperson from Senator Brownback's office told The Scientist.

As a contentious vote on cloning nears, both President George W. Bush and the House of Representatives have approved of a complete ban on cloning. Senator Brownback would need 60 votes for his original bill, a complete ban, to prevent filibustering (or endless delay by pontificating senators). Likely short of those 60 votes, and frustrated, according to an office spokesperson, that the opposing side has made the ground rules for voting floor procedures unfavorable and unacceptable, Brownback developed the idea for a moratorium. The moratorium proposal was reported but not confirmed in other media outlets this week.

The senator may also consider adding amendments to pending bills, for example prohibiting the patenting of human clones. Brownback has also modified one particularly controversial provision of his bill that called for the criminalization of the import of products or therapies derived from nuclear transplantation. In the new version, imported embryos, but not therapeutic products, would be forbidden, according to a report in Reuters.

The debate over cloning has for the most part taken place between those who believe therapeutic cloning should be allowed, but reproductive cloning banned, and those who wish to ban all kinds of cloning. Brownback has said that any effort to clone human beings represents a "new and decisive step toward turning human reproduction into a manufacturing process in which children are made in laboratories to preordained specifications."

Other senators disagree — notably Senator Orrin Hatch (Republican), who recently announced his support for legislation that allows cloning for the purposes of medical research. Such legislation is being cosponsored by Hatch along with Senators Arlen Specter (Republican), Tom Harkin (Democrat), Edward Kennedy (Democrat) and Dianne Feinstein (Democrat). Their bill, which also may be short on votes, allows for therapeutic cloning, but bans any cloning intended to lead to the birth of a live infant.