Today the National Taxpayers Union released Rates Congress, the fiscal scorecard grading every member of Congress on their votes in the 1st session of the 116th Congress. 48 Representatives and 5 Senators earned “A” grades from NTU, and will receive NTU’s annual “Taxpayers’ Friend Award” - a marked increase over the grades from 2018.
The Taxpayer Score measures the strength of support for reducing spending and opposing higher taxes. In general, a higher score is better because it means a member of Congress voted to spend less money. This year, NTU gives ratings of 86 or higher in the House and 80 or higher in the Senate an “A” - and with the average scores in the House and Senate at 40% and 30%, respectively, it takes a good deal of fiscal discipline to reach an A with NTU.
“The first session of the 116th congress brought both protections and pitfalls for taxpayers,” said NTU President Pete Sepp. “Although lawmakers came together to pass the most important IRS reform package in 20 years, there were challenging votes as well, like those on controversial drug pricing legislation and omnibus spending bills that overturned the fiscal responsibility of the Budget Control Act. Despite the drop in averages and medians, however, a greater overall number of Congress Members put in the extra effort to earn “A” grades. These top-performing lawmakers deserve the special recognition of our Taxpayers’ Friend Awards.”
NTU’s scorecard included hundreds of votes in the House and Senate, with a rating designed to calculate a Member’s voting record on fiscal responsibility by evaluating every vote that has an impact on tax, spending, trade and regulatory policy. No other fiscal policy scorecard is as comprehensive as NTU’s, which is in its 40th year of evaluating legislators.
See NTU’s full 2019 congressional scorecard and further analysis here.