A total of fifteen votes were used to score the current Senate on their views of fiscal and trade related issues. Two votes were taken from the 107th Session, four votes were taken from the 108th Session, and the remaining nine votes were taken from the first session of the 109th Congress. If a Senator was in office it was assumed that he or she could have voted on the legislation and not-voting was scored the same as voting against the position favored by the Freedom Democrats Scorecard. The average was based only on the votes a Senator was eligible to vote on by holding office. The scorecard only tracked the current composition of the Senate and the majority of the scorecard reflects votes taken since the last election. The only Senator that was unable to vote for the entire scorecard was Senator Menendez of New Jersey, who was appointed late in 2005. Senator Corzine was therefore tracked instead.

Vote 1- No Child Left Behind: President Bush was elected promising a vast expansion of the role of the federal government in education. This was a change from previous stances of Republican presidential candidates. On December 18, 2001 the Senate voted on the “No Child Left Behind” Act, which created an unfunded mandate that forced state and local governments to raise their property taxes. Ultimately the goal of Freedom Democrats should be to seek the repeal of this legislation.

Vote 2- Farm Bill: In a reversal of the Freedom to Farm Act of 1996 the Senate passed on May 8, 2002 a new Farm Bill that would greatly expand agricultural subsidies. A “no” vote was favored because most of this money goes to large agribusiness, not the family farms that are used as a mascot for agricultural subsidies.

Vote 3- Across the Board Cuts: On January 17, 2003 Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) offered an amendment to H.J. Res. 2, the Consolidated Appropriations Resolution, 2003, to eliminate all the 2.9% across-the-board cuts in discretionary spending. No proposal was provided for how to offset these spending increases, which would have added to the deficit. The scorecard opposed this amendment.

Vote 4- Defense Spending: Many politicians use defense spending as a convenient excuse for pork barrel projects that send money back to their districts. On July 16, 2003 Senator McCain (R-AZ) introduced an amendment to the Defense Appropriations Act that would have removed programs that were not authorized or requested. Although it was defeated, the scorecard favored this attempt at spending restraint.

Vote 5- Cuba Travel Ban: Free trade typically revolves around the movement of goods and services, and is traditionally favored by libertarians. We also favor the free travel of people, and as such we oppose embargo placed against Cuba. On October 23, 2003 the Senate voted on an amendment by Senator Dorgan (D-ND) to relax the restrictions against traveling to Cuba, which we view as a step in the right direction.

Vote 6- Congressional Pay Raises: During a period of growing deficits and when many Americans cannot find jobs we don’t believe that Congress should receive automatic pay raises. On October 23, 2003 Senator Feingold (D-WI) attempted to block the automatic pay raises that Congress receives unless they vote otherwise. Although it failed, we support his attempt. The Senate would later adopt a similar proposal in 2005 to limit their automatic pay raises in 2006. This scorecard prefers to reward the Senators who originally backed the proposal when it was first put forward.

Vote 7- PAY-GO Spending Restrictions: Senator Feingold (D-WI) introduced an amendment on March 16, 2005 to fully reinstate the PAY-GO rules that would require both changes to entitlement spending and any tax cut to be offset in order to pass by a simple majority in the Senate. This would have applied greater pressure on Congress to reign in spending. Senator Feingold has introduced similar amendments throughout this session of Congress but this vote, which was 50-50 and rejected with Vice President Dick Cheney casting the tie breaking vote against it, came the closest to actual passage.

Vote 8- Immigration Reform: Senator Craig (R-ID) introduced an amendment on April 19, 2005 that would offered a pathway to full citizenship for up to 1 million illegal immigrant agricultural workers and their families. This scorecard supports efforts to expand citizenship to those workers already here who are contributing to our economy. We oppose alternative proposals that focus on expanding guest-worker programs without expanding opportunities for citizenship.

Vote 9- Energy Subsidies & Loan Guarantees: In 2005 the Senate passed a massive energy bill with huge subsidies and loan guarantees to the energy industry. On June 23, 2005 Senator Sununu (R-NH) introduced an amendment that would strike out the language involving most of the loan guarantees for private power plants. Power plants should be financed by private investors and have to compete in a free and fair market. They should not receive aid from the government.

Vote 10- Subsidized Logging in National Forests: One of the largest boondoggles on public lands involves the subsidies given to logging companies that operate in the National Forests. A great deal of the lands managed by the Forest Service and other public land agencies are used for natural resources extraction like logging. While we are not opposed to such activities in general, we are opposed to the tax payer subsidizing these activities on public lands. An ideal solution would be the privatization of public lands already used in commercial activities. On June 29, 2005, Senator Sununu (R-NH) introduced an amendment that would prohibit the use of funds to subsidize such activities in the Tongass National Forest. The scorecard supports this as a temporary step in the right direction that would save the taxpayers money.

Vote 11- Highway Bill: On July 29, 2005, the Senate approved the conference report of the Transportation Equity Act of 2005. This bill, which authorized $286.5 billion for federal aid highway spending, was full of pork projects and earmarks totaling $24 billion. Its passage was strongly opposed by the scorecard.

Vote 12- Defense Travel System: Senator Coburn (R-OK) introduced an amendment on October 6, 2005 that would prevented funding of the Defense Travel System, an internet system used for bundling travel of members of the Defense Department. The system has been criticized as mismanaged and fiscally irresponsible. The scorecard supported the efforts of Senator Coburn and other Senators to reign in the program.

Vote 13- Coburn Bridges Amendment: Senator Coburn (R-OK) introduced two amendments on October 20, 2005 that would divert money from pork barrel projects to the funding of disaster relief in the Gulf Coast. One of these amendments was defeated with a procedural move to table the proposal. The other amendment was given an up or down vote on the Senate floor and was selected for the scorecard. Although not a true spending cut it tested the Senator’s support for pork barrel projects at any cost.

Vote 14- Spending Cap: Senator Inhofe (R-OK) introduced an amendment on November 3, 3005 that would have capped non-defense, non-trust fund spending at fiscal 2006 levels beginning in fiscal 2007. This cap could be waived by a three-fifths majority vote in the Senate. This cap was supported by the scorecard as a way to reign in spending, although we would have preferred going after defense spending as well.

Vote 15- Agricultural Subsidies Cap: Senator Grassley (R-IA) introduced an amendment on November 3, 2005 that would have capped the farm program payments at $250,000 per individual. The system of agricultural subsidies in America is in drastic need of reform and this cap on payments would have been a satisfactory measure toward reform.

The highest score was Russ Feingold of Wisconsin with a score of 80%. John McCain of Arizona was next with a score of 73.33%. The only other Senators to score over 50% were John Sununu of New Hampshire, Jon Kyl of Arizona, Evan Bayh of Indiana, Ron Wyden of Oregon, and Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico. The lowest score went to Ted Stevens of Alaska with a score of 6.67%. The lowest scoring Democrat was Joe Lieberman of Connecticut with a score of 13.3%.

The average score for the Senate was 33.04%. The average for the Senate Democrats was 37.36%; for the Senate Republicans the average score was 29.35%. This is a larger gap than previous economic scorecards, but the general conclusion is still the same. Both parties have comparably poor records on economic issues. The one Independent Senator, Jim Jeffords of Vermont, scored 46.67%. Although they were not scored on the same votes, this is the same score for Fiscal and Trade issues received by Independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who also represents the state of Vermont and is the most likely replacement for Jim Jeffords when he retires this year.

The above graph should help illustrate the general similarity between the two parties economically in contrast to the divide between the parties in social issues.