COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Supporters of Gov. Mark Sanford's plan to cut the state's top income tax rate mustered the votes Wednesday needed to bring what could become an all-night debate on the issue in the state Senate.

The 24-17 vote was intended to keep senators from leaving and increase the chances that supporters would be able to get the 28 votes they need to limit debate and force a decision on the Republican governor's top legislative priority.

If votes to limit debate fail, opponents could spend nearly all of the remaining time before adjournment talking about the bill and Sanford's vetoes.

Sanford wants the state's top income tax rate dropped to 4.75 percent from 7 percent during the next decade.

Senate Minority Leader John Land, D-Manning, took the floor for a second day to speak against the plan. It is "an ill-conceived, improper tax cut," Land said. It benefits just the top half of the state's taxpayers and would lock the state into spending less than it needs on education, health care and other critical services, he said.

Sanford says the bill will foster economic growth that creates jobs.

Sanford's vetoes in the state's $5.5 billion budget, issued late Tuesday night, didn't help prospects for the bill. Those vetoes hit projects for two Republican allies for the income tax break.

For instance, Senate Majority Leader Hugh Leatherman, R-Florence, lost, among other things, a nursing program that would be started at Francis Marion University in his district. Leatherman said it was critical for easing the statewide nursing shortage, but Sanford said that program should have been approved through the Commission on Higher Education.

And Sen. Scott Richardson, R-Hilton Head Island, lost $5 million earmarked for pumping sand onto the eroding beaches of Hunting Island State park. Sanford said the state's due for a hurricane that could wipe out the investment.

"Since when is the governor the guru of when hurricanes are going to land?" Richardson asked.

And the volume - 106 vetoes - could stymie anything else the Senate wants to get to, Leatherman said. "I don't see what the rationale is in sending that many vetoes," Leatherman said.

The breadth of the vetoes is "going to hurt him," Richardson said.

It's an example of Sanford's principles going "down to the minutia level," Richardson said. "If he is going to have success in the Legislature, I don't think you can get involved in every single spending issue and try to impose his will to the nth degree."