Skip to main content

THIS YEAR IN THE REPUBLICAN CONGRESS: BY THE NUMBERS

December 17, 2015
Blog Post

350: Days since the start of this Republican Congress as of December 21

Only 158: Days the GOP House has been in session this year, including 27 pro-forma days in which the House gaveled in & out in a matter of minutes & no legislative business was completed

7: Times House Republicans voted against closing the terrorist gun loophole and preventing people on the terrorist watchlist from buying firearms (Vote #690, Vote #688, Vote #685, Vote #682, Vote #666, Vote #653, Vote #646)

ZERO: Republicans who have signed the discharge petition to force a vote on H.R. 1076, Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act

244: Number of House Republicans who voted to block debate on bipartisan legislation to keep Americans safe with commonsense background checks to curb gun violence

167:Republicans who voted against a bipartisan budget agreement and NOT to uphold the full faith and credit of the United States on October 28, 2015

151: Republicans who voted to shut down the federal government on September 30, 2015

235: Republicans who voted to Pay China first – before our troops & disabled veterans – in the event Republicans were to cause the first-ever default on our nation's debt

100: Bills passed by Congress & signed into law, with only 13 of these bills being major bills (such as the Every Student Succeeds Act and the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act). 80 of the bills were noncontroversial, modest suspension bills; 1 was unfinished business from the 113th Congress; 3 were short-term continuing resolutions; 1 was simply to keep the Department of Homeland Security open for a few days; and 2 were very short-term extensions of the Highway Trust Fund

100: Percent of Republicans who voted against affirming climate change is real and that we must invest in a strong, sustainable energy future for our children

1.5 million: Number of private-sector jobs created or sustained by Export-Import Bank since 2007

128: Days House Republicans let the charter for the EX-IM Bank lapse, killing jobs and undermining economic growth, before finally passing a House transportation bill that included an EX-IM reauthorization

8: Times House Republicans voted against renewing the job-creating Export-Import Bank (Vote #529, Vote #521, Vote #497, Vote #483, Vote #379, Vote #371, Vote #126, Vote #116)

218: Total number of Democrats and Republicans who signed a discharge petition forcing a vote to reauthorize the EX-IM Bank

313: Number of Democrats and Republicans who voted YEA on passing the Kirk-Heitkamp bill to reauthorize the EX-IM Bank, after the House GOP Leadership spent months blocking this legislation from getting to the Floor

Nearly $5.5 million: Taxpayer dollars squandered so far during the House Republicans' politically-motivated Benghazi Select Committee

592: Days the Benghazi Select Committee has been ‘investigating' which is longer than the investigations of Pearl Harbor, Kennedy assassination, Iran-Contra, and Hurricane Katrina

4: Number of hearings aforementioned Benghazi Select Committee has held since inception last year

Nearly 11: Number of hours former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spent answering questions from the Benghazi Select Committee – weeks after the Republican Majority Leader admitted that the Committee was created to damage Secretary Clinton's poll numbers

64: House Republicans who voted against the long overdue rewrite of No Child Left Behind because it continued the civil rights legacy of public education in targeting federal spending to schools and districts with the highest concentration of low-income students

10: Times House Republicans have voted for bills attacking women's health care so far this year. (Vote #568, Vote #538, Vote #527, Vote #524, Vote #506, Vote #505, Vote #223, Vote #194, Vote #93, Vote #45)

100: Percent of House Republicans who voted against allowing a vote to protect women's right to demand equal pay for equal work

235: House Republicans who joined the Trump bandwagon by voting ‘yes' on the Donald Trump Act, legislation to second-guess the decisions made by police chiefs and sheriffs around the country about how best to police their communities and ensure public safety

ZERO: Comprehensive immigration reform bills brought to the floor by House Republican leaders this Congress

4: Times House Republicans have voted in support of the Confederate Battle Flag (Vote #429, Vote #426, Vote #425, Vote #385)

179: Days House Republicans have refused to vote on a resolution offered by Rep. Bennie Thompson to remove the Mississippi state flag from the House areas of the U.S. Capitol because it contains the Confederate Battle Flag

48: Closed rules in this session of Congress making it the Most Closed Session of Congress in history

8: Times the House GOP has voted in 2015 to repeal or undermine the Affordable Care Act (Vote #14, Vote #45, Vote #58, Vote #142, Vote #183, Vote #375, Vote #376, Vote #568)

61: Times House Republicans have voted to repeal or undermine the ACA since 2011

100: Percent of House Republicans who voted against bringing up the student loan refinancing bill

241: Republicans voted against protecting America's servicemembers and veterans from unscrupulous mortgage lenders' dishonest financial practices

99: Percent of House Republicans who voted to allow predatory lenders on military bases

241: Republicans who voted against bringing the Help Hire Our Heroes Act – a bill to provide training resources for veterans seeking good-paying jobs – to the floor for a vote

100: Percent of House Republicans who voted against allowing a vote to let American workers to earn just seven job-protected sick days each year

241: Number of House Republicans who voted against allowing the House to even debate the Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would protect Americans' most sacred right – the right to vote

100: Percent of House Republicans who voted to block measures to bring transparency to the unprecedented outside spending in our elections

79: Days House Republicans let key components of the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act – which provides health care to the heroes of 9/11 – lapse

95: Percent of Committees in the Republican Congress chaired by men

5: Times House GOP voted against a robust long-term transportation and infrastructure bill, paid for, in part, by stopping companies from renouncing their U.S. citizenship to avoid paying fair share of taxes at home (Vote #470; Vote #450, Vote #440, Vote #438, Vote #4)

$251 million: Cut to Amtrak funding passed by House Republican members of the Appropriations Committee one day after a deadly train accident in Philadelphia

6: Times GOP voted against bringing a clean bill to fund DHS to a vote even as a shutdown loomed (Vote #34, Vote #71, Vote #77, Vote #86, Vote #92, Vote #100)

2.9 million: Number of jobs that would be destroyed under the House GOP FY 2016 Budget

$2,000: The increase in taxes for middle class American families with children greenlighted by the final FY 2016 Republican Budget

$200,000: Average tax break for the wealthiest Americans making $1,000,000 or more greenlighted by the final FY 2016 Republican Budget

$269 billion: Tax breaks over 10 years House Republicans have passed for the wealthiest 0.2 percent of Americans in the country – 5,400 estates a year