(WASHINGTON) — After a series of delays and emotional protests, the Senate on Tuesday night approved a bill that will help veterans exposed to toxic burn pits.

The Senate began voting on the PACT Act around 5 p.m., with votes on three Republican amendments before a vote on final passage of the bill, which was 86-11. None of the proposed amendments passed.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on the floor called the passage a “wonderful moment, especially for all the people who made this happen.”

Just before the legislation passed, New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who helped lead the Democratic effort, could be heard saying “I’m so proud” to Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Jon Tester of Montana. The two embraced in a hug.

A group of Democrats were set to hold a press conference later Tuesday night following the vote.

The PACT Act had initially passed the Senate earlier this year. But after a quick fix in the House required the bill to be voted on again, 26 Republican senators changed their votes and blocked swift passage of the act last week — sparking outrage among Democrats and veterans groups.

Comedian and activist Jon Stewart has become the face of this legislation, joining veterans in protest outside the Capitol for the last several days. He’s harshly criticized Republicans — who in turn cited concerns about Democratic spending maneuvers — and demanded action from lawmakers.

“America’s heroes who fought in our wars outside sweating their a—- off with oxygen, battling all kinds of ailments” while Republican senators were sitting “in the air conditioning walled off from any of it,” Stewart said during a press conference in front of the Capitol building on Thursday. “They don’t have to hear it, they don’t have to see it. They don’t have to understand that these are human beings.”

Stewart was in the chamber Tuesday night for the vote, along with about 50-75 vets and supporters of the bill. He is expected to join Democrats as they address reporters.

He sat above in the gallery and was seemingly overcome with emotion for a moment after the vote. He appeared to choke up while the clerk read the names of the Senators who voted yes.

When the vote was called, he grabbed his chest. “Hallelujah” and “yeah” were also shouted from observes in the gallery.

Republicans had said they did not object to the new funding for veterans in the proposal but wanted the opportunity to modify a so-called “budget gimmick” they say could be exploited by Democrats.

Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., has led the GOP group in opposition, insisting on an amendment to change language in the bill that he said could free up $400 billion in existing funds already being used for veterans by shuffling the money inside the budget to use for unrelated purposes.

“What matters to a veteran whose ill because of a toxic exposure is that the money is there to cover what he needs, that’s what he should be concerned about and that will be there,” Toomey said Tuesday. “What I am trying to limit is the extent that they could use a budget gimmick to reclassify spending and go on an unrelated spending binge.”

Republicans attempted to close this perceived budget loophole during a Tuesday night vote, but the amendment failed to pass.

Two other amendments from Sens. Rand Paul and Marsha Blackburn also failed. Paul’s amendment aimed to reduce aid to other countries besides Israel over the next 10 years to offset some of the bill’s costs, while Blackburn’s amendment proposed allowing toxic-exposed veterans to go directly into community care.

Schumer on the floor called Tuesday’s development “good news.”

“Our veterans across America can breathe a sigh of relief,” he said. “The treatment that they deserve and have been denied by the VA because of all kinds of legal barriers and presumptions will now be gone.”

ABC News’ Trish Turner contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — Osama bin Laden’s successor, who helped coordinate the 9/11 terror attacks, was killed by a CIA drone strike in Afghanistan over the weekend.

President Joe Biden announced that Ayman al-Zawahiri, an al-Qaeda leader, was killed by two Hellfire missiles in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Saturday.

Biden reported that there were no known civilian casualties.

“Justice has been delivered, and this terrorist leader is no more. People around the world no longer need to fear the vicious and determined killer,” Biden said, speaking from the White House on Monday night.

Al-Zawahiri had traveled back to Taliban-controlled Kabul to reunite with his family after U.S. troop withdrawal last August, according to U.S. intelligence, which began to track al-Zawahiri prior to the attack.

Nearly a year after the United States withdrew from Afghanistan, leaving the country to Taliban-control and less international oversight, ABC News’ “Start Here” spoke to ABC’s Chief Global Affairs Correspondent Martha Raddatz about what al-Zawahiri’s death means for the United States.

START HERE: Can you tell us more about who this guy was and how he was killed?

RADDATZ: Well, it is so remarkable, Brad, that it’s been almost 21 years since they’ve been trying to find [al-Zawahiri]. But you just have to remember what a horrible human being he was.

[al-Zawahiri] helped in the assault on American soldiers in Somalia in 1993, bombing of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in ’98 and the suicide bombing on the USS Cole in Yemen. And, of course, the attack on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon Flight 93. His planning killed almost 3,000 people.

The U.S. had been tracking al-Zawahiri for, again, almost 21 years and yet never nailed down his exact location. They believe he was on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. That is a really rugged border, it’s really hard to find people in that. He had certainly escaped before from U.S. intelligence, but this time he showed up in Kabul, right in the center of the city in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in Kabul. Places where the warlords live. Places where anybody with money, whether corrupt or not, can be found in that neighborhood. And it’s also very close to where the U.S. used to have its embassy in Kabul.

So they started tracking him many months ago. They believe he went back to Kabul to reunite with his family. Of course, what you have to remember at the center of this is that the Taliban is now in charge in Afghanistan and they, of course, harbored terrorists before 9/11. That’s why we went to battle there in Afghanistan. They promised not to do that again. But the U.S. believes they knew that senior Taliban commanders knew that al-Zawahiri was there.

So [the CIA] tracked him for months. They developed a pattern of life, meaning they just knew when he moved around. They don’t believe he ever left that house. But he would often go out on the balcony and spend a long time on the balcony. And that’s where they got him.

They targeted him when he walked out on the balcony. The president gave the order earlier last week. So they fired on [al-Zawahiri] with two Hellfire missiles from that CIA drone and took him out as he stood on the balcony. His family, [the CIA] say, was inside and unharmed as far as they know that.

START HERE: Unbelievable there. And we should mention, Martha, you said it was President Biden that gave the green light. It was also Biden’s call to totally withdraw from Afghanistan 11 months ago… Is al-Qaeda getting much more comfortable in Afghanistan without us there?

RADDATZ: I think they are getting more comfortable and this will be a big lesson to [the CIA and the U.S.] that ISIS is probably feeling more comfortable, al-Qaeda is feeling more comfortable.

But if you can track someone down like [the CIA] did in the center of the city, you should be concerned about your safety if you are a terrorist.

On the other hand, let’s remember it was about a year ago when the U.S. military targeted someone they thought was a bomb maker and it turned out to be the wrong person. And civilians were killed in that U.S. military drone strike.

This strike, this CIA drone [strike on al-Zawahiri], was the first attack, as far as we know, by the U.S. since the withdrawal last year. And by all accounts, it was a successful one.

START HERE: Really successful, when you think about it, a drone strike that was killing somebody on the balcony and not the people in the rooms nearby that balcony. Unreal. Martha Raddatz, thanks a lot.

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(PHOENIX, Az.) — Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, who is running in Tuesday’s GOP Senate primary, said a review of the 2020 election found that just one ballot was cast in a dead voter’s name, refuting allegations, mostly from Trump supporters, that nearly 300 such ballots had been returned two years ago.

The finding from Brnovich’s office, revealed in a letter to state Senate President Karen Fann, also a Republican, marks another knock on a partisan review conducted by the Cyber Ninjas firm and propelled by Republican state senators.

The criminal investigation was sparked last year after former President Donald Trump and his allies alleged without evidence that voter fraud cost him a victory in the Grand Canyon State in 2020.

“After spending hundreds of hours reviewing these allegations, our investigators were able to determine only one of the 282 voters on the list was deceased at the time of the election. All other persons listed as deceased were found to be current voters,” Brnovich wrote, referencing the Cyber Ninjas report allegations.

Brnovich added that some of the claims “were so absurd” that the “names and birthdates didn’t even match the deceased, and others included dates of death after the election.”

“Our agents investigated all individuals that Cyber Ninjas reported as dead, and many were surprised to learn they were allegedly deceased,” he wrote.

“We supported the Arizona Senate’s ability to conduct an audit of Maricopa County’s elections and understand the importance of reviewing the results,” Brnovich wrote. “However, allegations of widespread deceased voters from the Senate Audit and other complaints…are insufficient and not corroborated.”

The letter from Brnovich did not say if there were any charges stemming from the one ballot cast on behalf of a deceased voter.

The Cyber Ninjas review, widely panned by Democrats and elections officials, focused on Maricopa County, Arizona’s largest county and the home to Phoenix. Despite the claims of the 282 ballots, the firm’s report still showed that now-President Joe Biden won the state by 360 more votes than originally believed.

Fann said in a statement that she is “thankful’ to Brnovich’s efforts.

“They asked us to do the hard work of fact finding, and we are delivering the facts. This step of the AG’s investigation is critical to restoring the diminished confidence our constituents expressed following the last election. We’re grateful for the increased voter integrity measures put in place after the audit revealed weaknesses in our election processes,” she said.

The report comes as debates over “election integrity” in the GOP Senate primary, which will pit Brnovich against Blake Masters and Jim Lamon, among others.

Masters and Lamon have questioned the results of the 2020 election in Arizona, while Brnovich has defended the vote in the state but has expressed concern over “serious vulnerabilities” in the electoral system.

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