Acting EPA Administration Andrew Wheeler has done a phenomenal job balancing protecting the environment and abiding by his constitutional obligations, all while preserving free market principles He will no doubt add to that legacy as full-time Administrator. Acting Administrator Wheeler recognizes that Washington bureaucrats do not know what’s best for America’s businesses, and does not try to run their companies. Instead, he gives the private sector the flexibility it needs to efficiently lower emissions and find the most cost-effective way to help the environment. He also understands that property rights are fundamental to our liberty and that government agencies have no business regulating our backyards.

As the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), Neomi Rao was charged with overseeing the implementation of government policies and reviewing draft regulations. This experience makes her uniquely qualified to assess the constitutionality of government regulations. Rao also founded the Center for the Study of the Administrative State at the Antonin Scalia Law School. There is perhaps no judicial nominee better positioned to reign in the excesses of the federal bureaucracy. Given this history, Neomi Rao is a fantastic pick and will carry on Brett Kavanaugh’s legacy on the D.C. Circuit of reigning in the excesses of the administrative state. She was already leading the way on regulatory reform as the head of OIRA facilitating billions in reduced regulatory economic burdens over the last two years. Now she has the opportunity to do so from the bench and set precedents that cannot be easily undone by future administrations.

The “Green New Deal” resolution seeks to transition America’s mostly free market economy into a socialist economy, bordering on full-fledged communism. The so-called “Green New Deal” is not grounded in any sense of reality. By one unofficial estimate, the resolution’s goals of government-run healthcare, a complete transition to renewable energy, “free” college for all, and universal basic income would cost $6.6 trillion annually, or 31 percent of projected gross domestic product (GDP) for 2019. To put this into perspective, the Congressional Budget Office projects that federal spending in 2019 will total $4.4 trillion, or 20.8 percent of GDP. This unofficial estimate does not include retrofitting or rebuilding every single building in the United States, a high-speed rail system that promises to make air travel unnecessary while ignoring the existence of oceans (sorry, Hawaii), increased subsidies for electric vehicles -- which currently draw their power from a grid fueled predominantly by a combination of coal, natural gas, and oil-fired electric power plants -- to replace all of the gas-fueled vehicles currently on the road, or any of the other unicorns promised to come down this socialist rainbow.

The Yemen War Powers Resolution, which has already been passed by both chambers of Congress, would require the removal of undeclared, unauthorized United States’ support for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen absent explicit congressional authorization.

The Export-Import Bank has operated without a quorum since July 2015. That should not change. The Export-Import Bank has been the face of cronyism, and, with a reauthorization deadline looming, conservatives and libertarians must push back against congressional attempts to reestablish a quorum and reauthorize the Bank.

The Export-Import Bank has operated without a quorum since July 2015. That should not change. The Export-Import Bank has been the face of cronyism, and, with a reauthorization deadline looming, conservatives and libertarians must push back against congressional attempts to reestablish a quorum and reauthorize the Bank.

The Export-Import Bank has operated without a quorum since July 2015. That should not change. The Export-Import Bank has been the face of cronyism, and, with a reauthorization deadline looming, conservatives and libertarians must push back against congressional attempts to reestablish a quorum and reauthorize the Bank.

The Supplemental Appropriations Act would provide for an additional $17.2 billion in emergency relief funds with no offsets, although the Disaster Relief Fund still has more than $29 billion in it. The bill would also further other big-government policies, including duplicative agriculture subsidies, National Flood Insurance Program reauthorization, and community development block grant spending. This bill, which is a modified and worsened version of another supplemental appropriations bill, H.R. 268, that passed the House in January. H.R. 2157 spends close to 50 percent more than H.R. 268 despite, again, no new funds being requested for these disasters. Because it will be brought to the floor as an emergency supplemental, the spending in it is also exempt from the Budget Control Act discretionary spending caps. Furthermore, H.R. 2157 would also ramp up agriculture subsidies that already distort the market and amount to no better than other defunct welfare programs. With $22 trillion of national debt and more being added with each passing day, we need to be spending more, not less. At the very least, we need to fully and honestly offset any new federal spending with further spending cuts.

Introduced by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the Pennies Plan Balanced Budget would cut two cents for every dollar of on-budget spending beginning in FY 2020. This would balance the federal budget by FY 2024, without making any changes to Social Security. Sen. Paul’s Pennies Plan Balanced Budget would address the concerning growth of federal spending by cutting two pennies from every dollar of on-budget spending. This would reduce on-budget spending by $183.1 billion in FY 2020 and $11.3 trillion in the unified budget. Although federal spending will be reduced under this budget proposal, federal spending will still rise by 18.2 percent over the budget window. The spending levels under the budget resolution would be enforceable under a point of order requiring five-eighths of members present and voting to waive. The Pennies Plan Balanced Budget includes reconciliation instructions to the Senate Finance Committee to extend the individual income tax reforms, including the pass-through changes, under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. The budget resolution also includes a reserve fund for the expansion of health savings accounts. This is a crucial health insurance reform that will put people in charge of their healthcare dollars and lower overall healthcare costs.

The Lee amendment would authorize $10.18 billion for the VCF over the next ten years (through 2029), which is the amount that the Congressional Budget Office has estimated is necessary for that time period. From 2030 through 2092, the Lee amendment would authorize another $10 billion for claims. This simple appropriation of funds would prevent the bill from, as written currently, giving a government program a completely blank check from Congress.

The Paul amendment would further the fiscal responsibility in the Lee amendment by requiring that the reauthorization of the VCF does not add new debt. “Any new spending that we are approaching, any new program that's going to have the longevity of 70, 80 years, should be offset by cutting spending that's less valuable," Sen. Paul said on the Senate floor.

The so-called "Bipartisan Budget Act of 2019," which would be more appropriately named the "Generational Theft Act," will increase the discretionary spending caps by more $320 billion over two fiscal years and suspend the debt limit through July 31, 2021. According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), discretionary spending would be $1.119 trillion in FY 2020 and $1.145 trillion in FY 2021. The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2019 would increase discretionary spending to $1.290 trillion in FY 2020 and $1.298 trillion in FY 2021. In total, this is a more than $320 billion spending increase over two fiscal years. Additionally, the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2019 also includes $156.5 billion over two fiscal years for overseas contingency operations (OCO), which is used by Congress to bypass the discretionary spending caps. Prior to this budget deal, the CBO projected that the budget deficit would be $892 billion for FY 2020 and $962 billion in FY 2021. The discretionary spending levels in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2019 guarantee a return to $1 trillion budget deficits. Making matters worse, the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2019 suspends the debt limit through July 31, 2021, providing the Department of the Treasury with a virtual blank check to borrow, accumulating more debt that future generations will have to shoulder. This deal on the discretionary spending caps is nothing short of a surrender by Republican “leadership” in the House and Senate and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. Of course, we’ll be told that spending cuts will be on the agenda when Republicans get control of Congress again. Sadly, those promises never seem to come to pass. After all, Republican “leadership” and rank-and-file members don’t have any intention of governing by the limited government rhetoric on which they campaign. Instead, these Republicans vote with Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) for higher spending and more debt.

This amendment, offered Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), would reduce spending authorized by the continuing resolution by 2 percent.

The Continuing Appropriations Act, H.R. 4378, would fund the federal government through November 21, 2019. The continued practice of governance by CR merely sets up another showdown where Congress will be pushed into enacting a massive last-second spending binge before they can go home for the holidays. It will continue spending at near-record deficit levels, while simultaneously including a host of program reauthorizations that ought to have been considered, and potentially amended, on their own. This spending continues at a level that will shortly lead us back to trillion-dollar annual deficits, while the national debt limit remains suspended through 2021, granting the federal government a blank check to tax future generations through spending money it does not possess.

Scalia is clearly a knowledgeable and highly qualified pick, having previously been appointed as the Department of Labor’s solicitor under President George W. Bush. He has since enjoyed a successful career as a lawyer on labor and employment issues. During his legal career, Scalia has been successful in pushing back against federal overreaches into workplace regulation. Such a voice at the Department of Labor will be valuable in ensuring that its mission to protect workers does not further spill over into unnecessary, job-killing red tape.

This amendment, offered Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), would reduce the appropriations authorized under H.R. 3055 by 2 percent. H.R. 3055 included the Senate’s versions of the Commerce, Justice, and Science; Agriculture, Rural Development, and Food and Drug Administration; Interior and Environment; and Transportation and Urban Development appropriations bills for FY 2020

Introduced by Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), S.J.Res. 52 targets guidance issued by the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Health and Human Services that made it easier for states to get “state innovation waivers” under Section 1332 of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The Trump administration has taken regulatory steps to provide more affordable private health insurance options through association health plans and short-term, limited-duration plans. In October 2018, the Department of the Treasury, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued guidance that further eases the process of applying for and receiving a waiver. The October 2018 guidance focuses on the coverage that is made available on the exchanges by health insurance companies rather than what consumers had purchased. States must still meet statutory requirements to be eligible for a waiver, but the guidance explains that the comprehensiveness and affordability requirement may be considered met “if access to coverage that is as affordable and comprehensive as coverage forecasted to have been available in the absence of the waiver is projected to be available to a comparable number of people under the waiver.” If an individual decides to purchase a more affordable, less comprehensive plan, the comprehensiveness and affordability requirement under Section 1332 will be met because there will be more comprehensive offerings on the exchanged that they could have opted to purchase. The guidance issued by the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Health and Human Services is not a cure-all for the issues that America’s health insurance system faces. Much more has to be done to address these issues, particularly through the legislative process. Unfortunately, congressional Democrats aren’t interested in solutions; many want more government involvement and the elimination of private health insurance.

This motion waives the Senate's "pay-as-you-go" (PAYGO) rules for H.R. 1865, allowing for a larger budget deficit.

Together, the FY 2020 spending bills, H.R. 1865 and H.R. 1158, total nearly $1.4 trillion in spending that flies far above the caps that Congress set for itself less than a decade ago meant to at least restrain spending. This has been continually ignored and voted away by members too afraid to practice the fiscal responsibility they preach and sell to voters on the campaign trail. Many of those same members will, unfortunately, vote for these packages as well. As we have now surpassed $23 trillion in national debt, there is already a mounting price to pay for Washington’s reckless fiscal “policy,” if it can be called that. The “policy” of both parties seems to be simply spending more and more without regard to the debt drag that this creates in our economy, let alone the fiscal crisis that slowly but surely will consume our country should we continue down this path.

Together, the FY 2020 spending bills, H.R. 1865 and H.R. 1158, total nearly $1.4 trillion in spending that flies far above the caps that Congress set for itself less than a decade ago meant to at least restrain spending. This has been continually ignored and voted away by members too afraid to practice the fiscal responsibility they preach and sell to voters on the campaign trail. Many of those same members will, unfortunately, vote for these packages as well. As we have now surpassed $23 trillion in national debt, there is already a mounting price to pay for Washington’s reckless fiscal “policy,” if it can be called that. The “policy” of both parties seems to be simply spending more and more without regard to the debt drag that this creates in our economy, let alone the fiscal crisis that slowly but surely will consume our country should we continue down this path.

Despite some tweaks to the original text produced by the House Select Committee on Intelligence, the FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act continues to represent an assault on the Fourth Amendment. The Bill of Rights is a cornerstone of our constitutional republic, and crucial to defending the civil liberties of all American citizens. FISA has caused damage to the Fourth Amendment for years, and now is a critical time to support genuine reform, such as the USA RIGHTS Act. The revised version of the FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act remains the exact opposite of reform, and it is worse than current law. The bill would continue the backdoor search, with an utterly meaningless “warrant requirement.” The caveats proposed to this purported “warrant requirement” are an end-run around the Fourth Amendment. The bill provides a path for the National Security Agency (NSA) to restart the practice of “abouts” collection. This means if a U.S. person mentions a potential surveillance target in a communication, the NSA can collect it, regardless of whether or not the U.S. person was communicating with anyone associated with the target.

This vote is for cloture on the Bipartisan Budget Act. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) had offered an amendment to restore the original spending caps under the Budget Control Act. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) "filled the tree," refusing to allow amendments. A vote for cloture is essentially a vote not to allow amendments.

The Schumer-McConnell spending deal, the Bipartisan Budget Act, is the worst-case scenario for fiscal conservatives under a Democratic president and Democrat-controlled Congress, but it is happening under a Republican president and Republican Congress. This is reckless spending, and a massive tax hike on future generations, made under the guise of “bipartisan negotiations.” This is deceitful, aggressive overspending by those elected to protect taxpayers. Leaving Americans with higher budget deficits likely over $1 trillion, and a national debt that will balloon to over $21 trillion, is no way to govern, and its weight falls squarely on the shoulders of taxpayers. This deal makes clear that Republicans only care about deficits and out-of-control federal spending under a Democratic president. With a Republican president and Republican control of the House and Senate, there is no other conclusion that one can possibly draw.

Russ Vought's nomination had been stalled by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who sought to leverage his obstruction of the nomination in exchange for more emergency supplemental funding for his home state. Vought's credentials to serve in this important post, which handles budget and regulatory policy for the White House, were never in question. Democrats opposed Vought's nomination over issues that have nothing to do with his ability to serve as deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act would provide targeted relief in the banking industry from onerous regulatory overreach into the financial sector created by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, commonly known as “Dodd-Frank.” Initially passed in response to the recession of 2008, Dodd-Frank created a series of reforms that were supposed to address the issues in the financial sector that had supposedly caused the recession, but instead created a climate of overregulation, authorized the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) with little to no oversight, and gave the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) the authority to label financial firms as too big to fail.

The Federal Reserve Transparency Act instructs the Comptroller General of the United States, who serves as the director of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to complete an audit of the Federal Reserve within 12 months of its enactment. A report of the findings of the audit would be required within 90 days of its completion. The bill would require the Federal Reserve to provide information to the GAO, currently excluded from audits under 31 USC 714(b), including discussions between the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department, as well as transactions with foreign banks. Should Leader McConnell bring this bill to the floor, FreedomWorks will substitute the cosponsor key vote for the roll call vote.

The CREATES Act would grant relief in court for generic and biosimilar competitors seeking FDA approval. This would clear the pathway for new drugs to enter the market, drastically reducing prices through increased competition. The cost savings stemming from this legislation could reach between 15 percent and 50 percent of current prices for impacted drugs. Should Leader McConnell bring this bill to the floor, FreedomWorks will substitute the cosponsor key vote for the roll call vote. Should Leader McConnell bring this bill to the floor, FreedomWorks will substitute the cosponsor key vote for the roll call vote.

The REINS Act would require congressional approval for economically significant rules promulgated by federal regulatory agencies. Under the REINS Act, the House and Senate would have to vote on a proposed rule and the president would have to sign it before enforcement of the rule can begin. The bill would give Congress 70 days to pass a resolution to approve a rule. If a resolution is not passed, the rule cannot take effect. Should Leader McConnell bring this bill to the floor, FreedomWorks will substitute the cosponsor key vote for the roll call vote.

The Earmark Elimination Act would make permanent the temporary moratorium on congressional earmarks put into effect in 2010 by creating a point of order against any provision within a bill that matches the definition of an earmark, and when raised would be stricken absent a two-thirds majority to override. Should Leader McConnell bring this bill to the floor, FreedomWorks will substitute the cosponsor key vote for the roll call vote.

The CBO Show Your Work Act would require the Congressional Budget Office to make the models and data employed to produce its analyses and cost estimates, as well as any details that were used, available to Congress and on the agency’s website. This much-needed transparency will allow interested parties outside of Congress to hold the CBO accountable. Should Leader McConnell bring this bill to the floor, FreedomWorks will substitute the cosponsor key vote for the roll call vote.

Altogether, the bill spends nearly $1.3 trillion in discretionary funds – $700 billion for defense, and $591 billion for non-defense – for fiscal year 2018 alone. These appropriations would bring us back to Obama-era trillion-dollar yearly deficits, and balloon our national debt to nearly $22 trillion. This level of spending for a unified Republican government is unacceptable and breaks the promises of every Republican member who ran on a platform of defending taxpayers, spending responsibly, and reigning in the size of government.

Between his time as an aviator in the United States Navy, his firsthand experience serving as the executive director of the Tulsa Air and Space Museum and Planetarium, and his work in Congress, Bridenstine is extraordinarily qualified for the role of NASA administrator. In this role at NASA, Bridenstine will have the ability to bring much-needed reform to the agency, implementing the same principles of free markets and government efficiency that he tirelessly fought for in Congress. Serving on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, Bridenstine became a champion of issues pertaining to air and space exploration.

The passage of this CRA would do nothing to change the prohibition against discrimination in the Equal Credit Opportunity Act that the guidance cites. It would simply roll back the gross regulatory overreach of the CFPB in claiming for itself -- behind closed doors and a screen of smoke -- a power that Congress, in the law that created the CFPB, explicitly banned the CFPB from having. As Sen. Moran said, the CFPB “had to work its magic to find a way to regulate auto dealers.” Good governing is done through accountable and transparent processes, not magic.

S.J.Res. 52 would undo the Restoring Internet Freedom Order and reinstate the Obama administration’s Internet red tape. This will hurt tech companies, as well as consumers. Internet access is becoming vital to commerce, and many Americans still lack connectivity. In order to get service to these most vulnerable parts of the country, we need an Internet free of the meddling hand of government, so it can innovate and expand as it did for so many years before the Obama-era regulations took effect.

S.J.Res. 52 would undo the Restoring Internet Freedom Order and reinstate the Obama administration’s Internet red tape. This will hurt tech companies, as well as consumers. Internet access is becoming vital to commerce, and many Americans still lack connectivity. In order to get service to these most vulnerable parts of the country, we need an Internet free of the meddling hand of government, so it can innovate and expand as it did for so many years before the Obama-era regulations took effect.

Sen. Paul’s resolution would balance the federal budget in five years by assuming the repeal of the 2018 Bipartisan Budget Act and from there cutting total outlays by one penny for every dollar spent, continuing for the next five years. At this point, the budget would be fully balanced and spending would be allowed to grow at one percent thereafter. Doing so would reduce spending by $404.8 billion in fiscal year 2019 and by $13.35 trillion over ten years relative to the baseline under current law.

Sen. Toomey’s amendment would apply the principles of the REINS Act to CFIUS to make sure Congress has a final say on these regulations. This will mean that only regulations that try to address truly predatory behavior will pass, while those that are unnecessary and anti-market will be stopped from taking effect. This was the intent of Congress when it authorized CFIUS and it should not abandon its ability to set policy in this way. Sen. Toomey’s amendment gives Congress this oversight.

Approving this initial $15 billion rescissions request in full -- pulling back funds sitting in useless accounts that can only otherwise be used to spend more in the future -- is a task that conservatives in Congress should wholeheartedly endorse. It is one of few opportunities to exercise any semblance of fiscal discipline. It is only one small step towards actually tackling Washington’s out-of-control spending addiction, but it represents a chance to begin this fight.

The Lee Amendment ensures that if the government wishes to making any such detention, that it have clear authorization to do so. The entire text of the Lee Amendment is consistent with the Constitution and with the prior Supreme Court cases that govern this issue. This amendment is narrow in scope, and will not hinder our counterterrorism efforts. This is merely to strengthen American citizens’ constitutional protections. The motion to table would kill this important provision.

This amendment would add work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps. The Senate stripped out this pro-work provision from their version of the Farm Bill. Work requirements are important for helping people rise out of welfare and becoming independent of government assistance. A vote to table the Lee-Cruz Amendment would prevent them from being added back in to the Senate text.

The motion to instruct simply states: “[M]anagers on the part of the Senate at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the Senate amendment to the bill H.R. 5895 be instructed to include language providing a role for Congress in making a determination under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 (19 U.S.C. 1862).” The administration has misused Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act to unilaterally impose tariffs – which are taxes – for purposes unrelated to national security. These tariffs threaten American consumers with higher prices and American businesses with retaliatory tariffs imposed by our trading partners.

This amendment, sponsored by sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) would reduce appropriations in the minibus by 11.39% across the board. This would result in cuts of $17.5 billion and would bring spending in line with the budget caps in place before passage of the Bipartisan Budget Act. Given that we are rapidly approaching a trillion dollar deficit, this is a necessary step to reining in government spending.

This amendment would prohibit funds from being used to carry out the District of Columbia’s recently-passed Health Insurance Requirement Act. The D.C. mandate states that a “taxpayer who fails to pay the District of Columbia shared responsibility payment imposed...shall be subject to all collection, enforcement, and administrative provisions applicable to unpaid taxes or fees, as provided in Chapter 18, Chapter 41, Chapter 42, Chapter 43, and Chapter 44 of this title.” When dissected fully, this includes levying and seizing property, or even imprisoning individuals for choosing not to purchase health insurance.

H.R. 6157 is more of the same profligate spending resulting from a broken budget process and members unwilling to stand up for their campaign promises of shrinking government and reducing spending. The bill appropriates $33 billion more for Defense than the FY 2018 omnibus and $16 billion more for Labor/HHS. It also includes a CR until December 7, setting up votes on a spending package during the lame-duck session that will almost certainly be packed with last-minute giveaways to special interests.

When it comes more broadly to the rampant expansion of the unconstitutional regulatory state, Judge Kavanaugh is perhaps second to none in standing up for the Constitution. According to Kavanaugh, if Congress hasn’t yet opined on a matter of deep economic significance, any regulation relating to that matter should be presumed unconstitutional. He recognizes that lawmaking, under Article I of the Constitution, was delegated to Congress, not unelected executive branch bureaucrats.

When it comes more broadly to the rampant expansion of the unconstitutional regulatory state, Judge Kavanaugh is perhaps second to none in standing up for the Constitution. According to Kavanaugh, if Congress hasn’t yet opined on a matter of deep economic significance, any regulation relating to that matter should be presumed unconstitutional. He recognizes that lawmaking, under Article I of the Constitution, was delegated to Congress, not unelected executive branch bureaucrats.

American taxpayers cannot afford to continue to use billions of dollars to prop up failing agri-businesses. The subsidies programs, as bloated and wasteful as they are now, will increase in cost by over one billion over the next ten years. This is inexcusable given our crushing national debt.

The resolution would simply reclaim Congress’ rightful and required Article I powers by mandating the removal of unauthorized U.S. armed forces from hostilities in or affecting the Republic of Yemen not later than 30 days after the adoption of the resolution, absent a declaration of war or specific authorization for engagement in such activities. In Yemen, the executive branch has very clearly gone a step too far. By providing mid-air refueling, targeting assistance, and intelligence sharing to the Saudi-led coalition in its bombing of the Houthis in Yemen, the U.S. is directly involved in the conflict. In no way connected to al-Qaeda or the Islamic State, U.S. military force against the Houthis remains unauthorized, falling outside of the scope of the 2001 and 2002 AUMFs. A power explicitly delegated to the deliberative bodies of Congress is being actively stripped from them, time and time again, even in an instance where the Department of Defense admits the unauthorized nature of the conflict. The people of the United States deserve to have their government respect the Constitution that protects our rights, and the men and women of our armed forces deserve to have their involvement in foreign conflicts vetted as statutorily and constitutionally mandated. The vote on the Yemen War Powers Resolution is a significant opportunity to affirm these basic principles.

The First Step Act would reform the federal criminal justice system to make our communities safer by reducing crime and focusing limited resources on the most dangerous offenders. By increasing access to and instituting incentives for inmate participation in recidivism reduction programming and by modestly modifying some sentencing laws, the First Step Act would provide much-needed changes to the federal criminal justice system. The bill would reform four areas of sentencing law by reforming 18 U.S.C. 924(c) stacking to clarify that enhancements for second and subsequent offenses are used only on those who are true recidivists, by tailoring 21 U.S.C. 841 to modify mandatory minimum sentence enhancements and those who they may apply to, by applying the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 retroactively, and by expanding the existing federal safety valve for judges sentencing individuals with little to no criminal history.

This resolution of disapproval of the Congressional Review Act nullifies the Department of the Interior's Stream Protection Rule. With an annual estimated cost of $81 million, according to the Department of the Interior's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, the Stream Protection Rule is another blow to the coal industry, which was a favorite target of the Obama administration. The National Mining Association estimates that rule will lead to billions of dollars in lost revenues to state and local governments, as well as the loss of between 113,000 and 280,000 jobs.

This resolution of disapproval of the Congressional Review Act nullifies the Securities and Exchange Commission's Disclosure of Payments by Resource Extraction Issuers rule. Promulgated under the authority of the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, or Dodd-Frank, this rule requires resource extraction issuers to include in annual reports the payment of any entity controlled by the regulated business to foreign governments or the United States government "for the purpose of the commercial development of oil, natural gas, or minerals." The Securities and Exchange Commission projects initial compliance costs between $239 million and $700 million and annual compliance costs between $96 million and $591 million.

An orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Price, who has a lifetime 89 percent score with FreedomWorks, would bring a unique perspective to the Department of Health and Human Services that is desperately needed at a time when America's health care system is facing significant challenges. The Department of Health and Human Services was one of the federal agencies primarily responsible for the implementation of ObamaCare. HHS promulgated or approved rules developed by agencies it oversees, including rules that led to millions of health insurance policy cancellations and so-called “essential benefits” that have increased the cost of health insurance premiums for Americans. While the details of an ObamaCare replacement supported by the House and Senate Republican conferences are yet to be developed and introduced in legislative text, Dr. Price is the ideal individual to lead this effort in the Trump administration.

The Office of Management and Budget is the largest office working in the Executive Office of the President of the United States. As OMB director, Rep. Mick Mulvaney (R-S.C.) would play a large role in preparing President Trump’s Budget, as well as evaluating the degree to which agency programs, policies, and procedures follow the president’s policies. With Rep. Mulvaney’s history of serious concern and constructive activity toward reining in Washington’s overspending, this nominee deserves our support to take Washington by the horns and fight for responsible spending levels at the federal level.

The EPA has become the most notorious offender in the unconstitutional fourth branch of government that we know as the regulatory state. It has promulgated rules and regulations, such as the Clean Power Plan, aimed at destroying an entire industry, hurting workers and their families. Under Scott Pruitt's leadership at the EPA, Americans will have safe air and water and protection from government overreach through rules and regulations. Pruitt is a staunch believer in federalism and Article I of the Constitution, which charges the legislative branch with the power to make laws, not executive-level regulatory agencies.

This resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review Act nullifies a the Department of Defense, the General Services Administration, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's relating to the Federal Acquisition Regulation. This regulation requires federal contractors to disclose decisions on the reporting of violations of federal labor laws and creates paycheck transparency protections for employees of federal contractors. The rule is expected to cost employers $458.3 million in the first year, $413.7 million in the second year, and between $398.5 million and $400 million annually thereafter.

This resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review Act, which gives Congress authority to effectively nullify regulations submitted for review by federal agencies within 60 legislative days, would cancel the Department of Education’s Accountability and State Plans Rule. The Department of Education’s Accountability and State Plans Rule implements part of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and leaves open a loophole that federal bureaucrats could exploit to force Common Core on states that haven't implemented the standards. Education officials from several states and local jurisdictions strongly opposed the rule when it was being crafted.

he resolution would prevent the FCC from implementing rules that dictate the way broadband Internet service providers handle their customers’ personal information. S.J.Res. 34 passed the Senate last week by a vote of 50 to 48. Although consumer data privacy is of significant concern to every American, the proper parties should address the issue. In this area, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has historically held authority on the establishment and enforcement of general online privacy rules. Since the FCC can only regulate a portion of the Internet sphere – service providers like Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T – other Internet companies, namely websites like Facebook and Google, would escape any stringent data privacy rules enacted by the FCC. Creating more regulation in an uneven fashion would not only benefit certain companies in the industry by creating a clear advantage in digital advertising, it would also fail to achieve any consumer data protection purpose. In order to provide Americans with more robust and clearly defined protective measures, it is important to allow Congress and the FTC to set the rules in this sphere. Enabling other agencies to further restrict only a certain portion of an industry burdens privacy, progress, and business. It is important to move away from the Obama-era, regulatory induced system we have seen grow over the last eight years.

Our activist community drove more than 1.7 million messages to the Senate urging Members to preserve this important seat on the High Court for someone who respects the rule of law and a textual interpretation of the Constitution. With the nomination of Judge Gorsuch, we now have the opportunity to follow through by solidifying the conservative bloc on the Supreme Court. As explained by SCOTUSBlog, “some of the parallels” between Justice Scalia and Judge Gorsuch “can be downright eerie.” Indeed, Judge Gorsuch has the same originalist and textualist approach to the Constitution and narrow application of criminal laws against defendants and support for mens rea, or criminal intent, requirements in federal law in common. The key difference between Justice Scalia and Judge Gorsuch is that Judge Gorsuch has written critically of the Supreme Court’s 1984 "Chevron deference," which requires federal courts to defer to regulatory agencies’ interpretations of “silent or ambiguous” statutes. The Chevron deference has allowed federal bureaucrats to enact law without judicial review, undermining the separation of powers in the Constitution.

The process for the Consolidated Appropriations Act, which funds the federal government for the remainder of FY 2017, could not have been worse. This massive, nearly 1,700-page spending measure was negotiated behind closed doors between congressional leadership from both chambers and appropriators. With a Republican-controlled Congress and a Republican president, this spending bill reflects Obama-era spending levels. The bill annualizes base discretionary spending for FY 2017 at $1.07 trillion. This spending level blows through the spending caps established by the Budget Control Act of 2011 by $30 billion. The bill spends an additional $106 billion for overseas contingency operations, disaster relief, and other spending, which isn’t counted toward the spending caps. In total, the bill authorizes more than $1.175 trillion in annualized discretionary spending for FY 2017. The bill also falls short of promoting conservative priorities. While the bill does renew the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program and does not include funding for ObamaCare’s cost-sharing subsidies, it allocates nearly $296 million to bail out Puerto Rico’s Medicaid program, preserves current spending levels for the Environmental Protection Agency, increases spending for the National Institutes of Health and the National Endowment for the Arts, and provides a bailout for a private sector labor union.

This vote was on the motion to proceed to consideration of H.J.Res. 36, which would have canceled the Bureau of Land Management’s Methane Rule. With annual compliance costs between $114 million and $279 million, the so-called “venting and flaring” rule purports to reduce waste from “reduce the waste of natural gas from mineral leases administered” by the Bureau of Land Management. In reality, the purpose of the rule is to discourage oil and gas production on land overseen by the agency. The Bureau of Land Management estimates annual compliance costs between $114 million and $279 million.

The current authorization expires in December, which means that Congress must reauthorize it by the end of the year. S. 1287 bill would eliminate the need for reauthorization, granting indefinite authority for a program that collects information on, potentially, millions of Americans. Section 702 allows the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to collect electronic communications by non-citizens of interest to the federal government. Officially, the program is not supposed to target U.S. citizens, but intelligence agencies cast a wide net and often the communications of Americans can be swept up by the surveillance as well. Given the sweeping powers in Section 702 and the potential for misuse, this program should require congressional oversight, which can be used to assess both terrorism and privacy concerns. Granting this surveillance authority indefinitely, as S. 1297 does, limits even further Congress’s ability to oversee this program.

This vote simply allows the Senate to begin debate on the House-passed version of H.R. 1628, the American Health Care Act.

This amendment is virtually identical to the 2015 ObamaCare repeal bill – the Restoring Americans’ Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act, H.R. 3762. This bill passed the Senate by a vote of 52 to 47, with only two unsurprising Republican defections. For more than seven years, Republicans successfully campaigned on ObamaCare repeal. They made floor speeches in support of repeal, and they voted to pass a repeal bill less than two years ago. Grassroots conservative activists are not going to accept excuses if Republicans fail to pass a bill that they have passed once before. The ObamaCare Repeal Reconciliation Act would repeal much of ObamaCare – including the tax and cost sharing subsidies, Medicaid expansion, and the taxes that came with the law – with a two-year delay to pass a replacement. This delay provides more than ample time to reach an agreement on a replacement bill or package. President Donald Trump has indicated that he will sign a 2015-style ObamaCare bill into law. Senate Republicans should do as they did in December 2015 and pass a bill that delivers on their frequent promises to repeal ObamaCare.

The amendment offered by Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) would increase the debt limit and fund the federal government through December 8 without any spending or regulatory reforms.

Chairman Pai has served on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) since May 2012. Chairman Pai should not only be confirmed for his record of eloquently championing sensible regulation grounded by market principles, but because he also serves as an example of what the American people deserve from officials in Washington. Pai’s efforts, particularly on the debate surrounding Title II of the Communications Act of 1934, demonstrate his commitment to policies that work rather than policies that simply grow the power of government and relevance of his position as a regulator.

This amendment, sponsored by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), would reduce discretionary spending by $43 billion.

This amendment, sponsored by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), would create reconciliation instructions to repeal and replace ObamaCare, providing a path to follow through on more than seven years of promises after the Senate's failure this year.

It has been more than 30 years since Congress passed fundamental tax reform. Since that time, the tax code has become riddled with carve-outs that benefit politically connected special interests. Today, there are more than 74,000 pages in the tax code. According to the Tax Foundation, Americans spent 8.9 billion hours and $409 billion on tax compliance in 2016. Congress has a generational opportunity to reform the tax code by consolidating and lowering tax rates, broadening the tax base, and promoting job creation and international competitiveness for American businesses. This will make the tax code fairer and simplify the filing process, allowing the vast majority of Americans to file their taxes on a postcard. There is no doubt that 2017 has been a frustrating year for conservatives. Failure on fundamental tax reform is not an option. Passage of the FY 2018 budget resolution is the first step in this process. This is a step that the Senate must take.

No one disagrees with the need for assistance for areas recently impacted by disasters. Nevertheless, the concern with the Additional Supplement Appropriations for Disaster Relief Requirements Act is that Congress is spending $36.5 billion without any spending offsets. Sadly, some, like Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas), are demanding more money, attempting to extort additional funds by blocking a conservative nominee. Currently, the national debt is $20.4 trillion. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the projected budget deficit for FY 2017 and FY 2018 is $804 billion and $855 billion, respectively. Congress is only a few years away from the $1+ trillion deficits that Republicans frequently and rightly criticized under President Barack Obama. Long-term budget projections are even more ominous. Unfortunately, Congress continues to kick the can down the road, avoiding difficult decisions.

This resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review Act (CRA) would cancel the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) arbitration rule. The final rule was published on Regulations.gov on July 19. While the CRA isn’t a panacea, it does provide a means for Congress to act as a check on out-of-control federal agencies. The CFPB’s arbitration rule is, in reality, a giveaway to trial lawyers. The rule ostensibly bans contractual arbitration clauses related to consumer financial products offered by banks and other financial sector firms. This severely limits consumers’ ability to enter into arbitration during disputes. Arbitration is an easier and quicker process for consumers to resolve issues, but lawyers don’t make much money from this process. The rule, however, will encourage trial lawyers to pursue more class-action lawsuits, which take longer and result in smaller payouts to consumers. But class-action lawsuits do bring in big dollars for trial lawyers. Class-action lawsuits can take two to five years to resolve, and the average payment is $32.35 per individual. These class-action suits, for which trial lawyers are paid an average of roughly $1 million, also drive up costs to consumers. By comparison, arbitration typically takes two to five months, with an average payment of thousands of dollars. It’s clear which process truly protects consumers.

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act lowers individual rates for the vast majority of taxpayers. In addition, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act nearly doubles the standard deduction, meaning Americans keep more of their hard-earned money, and doubles the child tax credit from $1,000 to $2,000. This bill also provides relief by doubling the exemption amount from the unfair death tax. Pass-through business owners, who file their taxes on their individual tax return, will be able to take a 20 percent deduction. This lowers the tax burden currently faced by pass-through businesses, which, according to the Tax Foundation, employ 70 million people, and promotes fairness. America’s business community will also see added growth as a result of the policy changes in this bill. The corporate tax rate will be lowered substantially from 35 percent to 21 percent, making American businesses more globally competitive and allowing them the resources they need to innovate and create jobs. It also eliminates confusion and complexity so job creators can focus on building their company and hiring working Americans. This bill also repeals the harmful ObamaCare individual mandate, a coercive tax on Americans. It’s estimated that 80 percent of households subject to this tax earn less than $50,000 per year. This is an unnecessary hardship being placed on working Americans. The federal government should not punish individuals who cannot afford ObamaCare’s costly health insurance plans or decide it is not the best course for them.

This amendment, S.Amdt. 4685, offered by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), to the Senate version of the Commerce, Justice, Science spending bill would greatly expand the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) surveillance powers, giving the agency the ability to collect sensitive, personal information about American citizens’ online activities. The Fourth Amendment is an important protection against government intrusions into our lives, and we should be wary of any legislation that threatens such a fundamental right. The amendment would allow the FBI to collect Electronic Communications Transactional Records (ECTRs) which includes information about web browsing history, the to/from lines of emails, and location information from IP addresses with only an administrative subpoena, also known as a National Security Letter. In addition to not requiring a warrant, national security letters also include a gag order, so companies cannot even inform their customers that their data is being turned over to federal law enforcement officials.

This resolution, S.J. Res. 28, offered by Sens. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.), John McCain (R-Ariz.), and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) would roll back an unnecessary, expensive, and duplicative federal regulation on catfish at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The resolution would save taxpayers $14.4 million. Federal regulations like this one are part of the regulatory state that burdens individuals and the economy with complex and expensive rules.

To modify the authority of the President of the United States to declare national monuments.

To require campaign finance disclosures for certain persons benefiting from fossil fuel activities.

To make appropriations to address the heroin and opioid drug abuse epidemic for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2016

John B. King, of New York, to be Secretary of Education

To provide for the establishment of free market enterprise zones in order to help facilitate the creation of new jobs, entrepreneurial opportunities, enhances and renewed educational opportunities, and increased community involvement in bankrupt or economically distressed areas.

To nullify a Department of Labor rule published on April 8, 2016, relating to the definition of the term "fiduciary" and the conflict of interest rule with respect to retirement investment advice.

To reauthorize and amend the National Sea Grant College Program Act, and for other purposes

H.R. 2 is a bill to permanently prevent a scheduled cut in payments to doctors under Medicare, as well as to reauthorize S-CHIP - the federal health insurance program for children. Aside from numerous other policy issues, this bill also adds over $140 billion to the deficit over ten years. This amendment by Senator Mike Lee would invoke the statutory pay-as-you-go requirement so that Congress would be forced to find savings to erase the deficits created by this bill.

This amendment, by Senator Flake, would strike the extension of the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program from the bill to create fast-track trade authority. TAA is an ineffective and duplicative program that gives financial assistance to workers and companies that have been negatively affected by free trade. TAA has been shown to be ineffective and even harmful to those it is supposed to benefit, and should be allowed to expire.

This amendment by Senator Lee would allow parents to opt their children out of having to take federally mandated standardized tests, while ensuring that schools are not penalized for these students not being tested.

This amendment by Senator Cruz would prohibit the Department of Education from forcing states to adhere to any federal testing standards, allowing states to determine their own assessment plans for public schools.

The Export-Import Bank is an 80-year-old corporate welfare program that ought to be allowed to expire. That Republican leaders prioritize Ex-Im instead of conservative priorities confirms that they fail to address the expansion...

This amendment by Senator Ron Wyden would address one of the most glaring issues with the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISA), by requiring that companies sharing cyber threat data with the government first scrub non-essential personally identifiable information (PII) from the reports first. Without this amendment, CISA creates a perverse incentive for companies to be less careful about the sharing of their customers' personal data - which would be shared in real times across many government agencies, including the NSA.

This bill was the vehicle for the budget agreement that will spend $80 billion beyond the Budget Control Act caps over two years, along with $16 billion in new defense spending that doesn't count towards the caps. The supposed offsets to this spending are mostly either gimmicks or long-term, while the new deficit spending is immediate. The bill also suspends the debt ceiling through March of 2017, effectively giving the government a blank check for that period.

This resolution invokes the Congressional Act to disapprove of the recent EPA rule that greatly increases emissions restrictions on existing coal-fired power plants. This tremendously destructive regulation would greatly increase energy costs in the many states which rely heavily upon coal-fired power plants for their electricity. These cost increases damage overall economic growth, and in particular lower the standard of living of lower-income earners.

This resolution invokes the Congressional Act to disapprove of the recent EPA rule that greatly increases emissions restrictions on any future coal-fired power plants. This rule tightens emissions standards to the point where it will likely not be economically feasible to build new coal-fired electric plants, crippling one of the most abundant and cost-effective sources of energy in America.

This amendment by Senator Sherrod Brown would make permanent the 100 percent federal match rate for Medicaid enrollees under the ObamaCare expansion of that program. This would completely remove the incentive for states to resist expanding Medicaid because it would be largely free for them. This increase in permanent federal entitlement spending would be paid for by a tax increase on higher income earners.

This bill uses the budget reconciliation process to repeal all of the parts of ObamaCare that have a budgetary impact, which would eliminate nearly all of ObamaCare's core functions. Among the programs repealed are the Medicaid expansion, the insurance premium subsidies, the insurance mandates, several grant programs, and all of the new taxes. Because of the reconciliation procedure, this bill only requires 50 votes to pass.

This bill would renew federal highway funding to states for a period of five years. However, it does not solve the structural deficit within the Highway Trust Fund, doesn't eliminate the wasteful spending that takes away from funding roads, and doesn't offset that spending in any real way. Furthermore, this bill contains a reauthorization of the expired Export-Import Bank, in order to prevent having a standalone vote on renewing such a direct corporate welfare fund.

This omnibus appropriations bills for Fiscal Year 2016 funds former Speaker Boehner's budget-busting deal to the tune of $50 billion above the budget caps for 2016. It contains several very troubling legislative riders a well, including more funding for the IMF, and a massive new cybersecurity information sharing program that violates consumers' privacy and due process. It also fails to include most of the amendments from the appropriations process that would have defunded key, harmful federal regulations.

This final version of the Farm Bill, reconciled between the House and Senate, actually undoes some of the already modest reforms to crop insurance and food stamps that were previously in the bill. This five-year reauthorization of the Farm Bill will spend nearly a trillion dollars over ten years, and remains loaded with corporate welfare and special carve-outs for well-connected agricultural corporations.

This bill suspends the debt limit until March 15th of 2015, allowing the president to potentially run up as much debt as he pleases during that time period. The debt is already projected to increase by about $1 trillion over that period, to over $18 trillion. Meanwhile, this debt ceiling suspension contains no reforms to curb spending whatsoever.

This amendment replaced an unrelated bill with a bill to extend federal unemployment insurance benefits by a further six months, starting retroactively in January 2014. Federal unemployment assistance was meant to be temporary, as states already have their own safety nets for the unemployed. Extending this program is an unnecessary cost to taxpayers, and creates perverse incentives than can cause job-seekers more difficulty in finding work.

This bipartisan energy bill further subsidizes state projects to make buildings more energy efficient, among various green subsidies. Many of the provisions of this bill are duplicative, and all would be better handled by states themselves. The projects and the accompanying regulations are theoretically voluntary, but with 'incentives' and studies aimed at coercing states to accept them.

David Jeremiah Barron is a troubling judicial nominee due to his explicit advocacy of judicial activism. He was also the White House legal counsel who approved the extralegal killing of a non-combatant American citizen in Yemen - an unprecedented violation of Constitutional rights to due process and trial.

This was the crucial vote for the nomination of Sylvia Burwell to replace the retiring Kathleen Sebelius as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS). During her tenure as Chair of the Office of Management and Budget, Burwell oversaw the Obama Administration's attempts to make the partial government shutdown of 2013 as visibly inconvenient as possible, including famously shutting WWII veterans out of their own (open-air) memorial. Thus, it appears unlikely that Burwell would be willing to change the opaque and uncooperative practices of HHS, which is overseeing the implementation of ObamaCare.

This bill would allow students to refinance their private loans into a lower-interest government loan. To pay for this, the bill also contains the so-called "Buffett Tax", a new alternative minimum tax rate that would greatly increase tax rates for higher-income individuals and small businesses.

This amendment by Sen. Mike Lee would stop the cycle of mismanagement and bankruptcy in the Highway Trust Fund by devolving that funding directly to the states over a period of 5 years. Cutting out the federal middleman for highway infrastructure projects will allow states to more accurately address their own needs, and at a lower cost than under the current system.

This bill bails out the nearly depleted Highway Trust Fund through May of 2015, using revenue gimmicks to supposedly offset most of the cost. The Highway Trust Fund desperately needs reform instead of merely continuing to receive periodic taxpayer bailouts.

This constitutional amendment would allow the government broad power to legally define what constitutes political speech for the purposes of regulating expenditures on behalf of candidates. This means that anything from books, movies, billboards, or any other funded public expression that is deemed "political" could be regulated and potentially limited. Effectively, this amendment would place constitutional limits on free speech, stripping away many First Amendment freedoms.

This bill purports to ban unequal pay on account of gender. But by making unequal pay illegal, it exposes employers to expensive and time-consuming frivolous lawsuits for any perceived inequality. The "wage gap" that this policy is supposed to address has been shown by repeated studies to be diminishing on its own, and is in fact non-existent in most industries.

This trillion-plus dollar spending bill was crafted behind closed doors and was packed with dozens of policy riders that Congress never had a chance to vote on individually. It continues to fund the federal government fully, with zero reforms to the government's out-of-control spending.

This amendment, sponsored by Senator Mike Lee (UT), would offset the cost of the emergency spending in the Disaster Relief Act over time by making a .49% across-the board cut to discretionary spending. Such a minor spending cut in order to offset a large amount of deficit spending should be an easy call given the current $16.4 trillion national debt.

This bill is an "emergency" appropriations bill that contains $50.1 billion in spending that is supposed to aid those affected by Hurricane Sandy. In reality, however, most of the spending will not provide acute disaster relief, and much of it is not even scheduled to be spent until 2014 or later. Thus, the bill functions more like a stimulus than true disaster relief and its spending should be appropriated through the budget process instead of as emergency spending that adds to the federal deficit.

This amendment would require that, upon reaching the debt limit, the Treasury would prioritize military pay, Social Security obligations, and payments of interest on the national debt. This would prevent the executive branch from making the claim that reaching the debt ceiling would prevent Social Security checks from being sent, since the government incurs enough revenue to meet these obligations without borrowing.

This bill raises the statutory limit on the public debt (the "debt ceiling") by whatever amount is necessary to reach May 19th, 2013. Although the bill theoretically contains a "no budget, no pay" provision conditional upon the Senate passing a budget resolution, in reality the provision has no teeth. FreedomWorks insists that further increases in the debt ceiling by accompanied by proportional decreases in federal spending in order to address the ever-increasing federal debt, which at the time of this bill stood at $16.4 trillion. Instead, this bill amounts to a "clean" debt ceiling hike, accompanied by the unenforceable promise of spending reforms at a later date.

This amendment would effectively defund ObamaCare by tying its funding to economic growth reaching historical average levels. Defunding ObamaCare would reduce ten-year spending by over $1 trillion and would go a long way towards reducing our government's massive annual deficits.

This is the amended version of the bill containing the Continuing Resolution to fund the federal government through the end of the fiscal year. The bill still funds ObamaCare, and continues to institutionalize current levels of deficit spending. In addition, the House and Senate each added several departmental appropriation bills into the C.R., bypassing regular order and the amendment process that ought to accompany each of these spending bills individually.

This budget amendment was a proxy vote for the Marketplace Fairness Act, which would allow states to band together to collect taxes on internet sales from citizens of other states. This type of internet sales tax scheme violates the physical presence standard of tax collection and would place an undue compliance burden upon online retailers.

This amendment would make federal education dollars under No Child Left Behind portable so that lower-income parents could use that money towards sending their child to another school. This would be a good first step towards offering parents true choice in their children's education.

This amendment to the Senate's budget resolution would call for the outright elimination of the estate tax (better known as the "death tax"). The death tax is absolutely unjust because it taxes assets that have already been taxed before, and it punishes those who have saved their money over a lifetime to pass on to the next generation. This tax is particularly devastating to small businesses and family farms.

This is Senator Rand Paul's budget plan, which would balance in five years, eliminate four Cabinet departments, replace the current tax code with a flat tax, and fundamentally reform all major entitlement programs.

This amendment would prevent taxpayer resources from being used to automatically deduct union dues from the paychecks of unionized federal employees. Federal workers, most of whom have never had the opportunity to vote on whether or not they wish to be unionized, ought to be able to decide if they wish to pay dues to their unions. Much of the collected dues are used for union political activities, which a given employee may or may not agree with.

This is the Senate Democrats' budget plan, which raises taxes by nearly $1 trillion while using budget gimmicks to claim $1.8 trillion in spending cuts. In reality, the budget never achieves balance and actually increases spending in the first year, while failing to address the primary drivers of government spending - entitlements - at all.

This bill allows states to collect taxes on internet sales from businesses in other states. This violates the physical presence standard that has governed tax collection since our founding, and raises constitutional issues about businesses being forced to bear the expense of complying with tax collection for states in which they have no representation.

The so-called "Farm Bill" is actually a combination of agricultural policy and welfare, with food stamps accounting for 80 percent of the bill's nearly trillion dollars in projected spending. Aside from failing to contain the multitude of faults within the rapidly-expanding food welfare programs, the agricultural portion of the bill is an amalgam of direct corporate welfare for insurance companies and farm corporations and special carve-outs and price supports for the specific industries with the best lobbyists.

This bill would fund the Departments of Transportation and Housing & Urban Development (and related agencies) for Fiscal Year 2014. Besides doing nothing to reform the large amount of wasteful spending contained in both departments to begin with, this bill actually increases spending for the departments to pre-sequestration levels. This is part of the broader Democratic strategy to eliminate the only real spending cuts that have been achieved since 2010.

Senator Mike Lee solicited signers on a letter to Senator Harry Reid, which declared that the signers would not vote for any appropriations bill, including a Continuing Resolution (CR), that contained further funding for ObamaCare's implementation or enforcement. The letter put senators on the record committing to actually defunding ObamaCare using a must-pass bill (the CR), rather than just taking another symbolic vote on an amendment that the Democrats could easily defeat.

This is the crucial vote to end debate on the Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the federal government while ending funding for ObamaCare. Voting for cloture would allow Senate Democrats to resume funding ObamaCare with a straight party-line vote, meaning that a 'yea' vote here is a vote to fund ObamaCare, with the law's first starting date just days away.

H.R. 2775 was used as the vehicle for the Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the federal government. This bill funds the government fully (including ObamaCare) through January 15th of 2014, suspends the debt ceiling until February of 2014, and obliges both chambers of Congress to go to conference on a full-year budget. In other words, this CR allows for more uncontrolled spending and debt, with no reforms to either, does nothing to address ObamaCare, and potentially promises more future spending if a budget agreement is reached.

This is the final vote of a complicated Senate parliamentary procedure often referred to as the "Nuclear Option", used the allow the Senate's rules to be changed using only a simple majority vote. Majority Leader Harry Reid used this procedure to allow all executive nominations (except Supreme Court nominees) to pass without a cloture vote, meaning that he only needs 51 votes instead of 60. This is a massive blow to the rights of the minority party in the Senate, and sets a dangerous precedent of tyrannical majority rule in a Senate that has traditionally prized the rights of every Senator and party to have their full say.

This is the vote to end debate on the budget deal negotiated by Congressman Paul Ryan and Senator Patty Murray. The deal breaks the budget caps established in 2011 by $63 billion over two years, while claiming to contain a net deficit reduction over ten years by raising fees and making other minor cuts. With no guarantee that future congresses will obey the scheduled spending cuts, this bill delivers increases in both spending and taxes in exchange for no meaningful reforms. Voting for cloture allowed the bill to be passed by a simple majority vote.

Sen. Coburn's amendment to the STOCK Act would prevent duplicative and overlapping government programs.

This amendment to the federal highway spending bill would reduce the federal government’s role in transportation funding by giving states direct control of their shares of the transportation funds.

This amendment would eliminate many energy tax subsidies, which distort the market by picking winners and losers in the energy industry. In addition this amendment would lower the U.S. corporate tax rate, which is currently the highest in the industrialized world and is one of the major reasons that many companies choose to locate their operations elsewhere.

This amendment would reauthorize the Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im bank), which is scheduled to expire at the end of May. The Export-Import Bank takes money from American taxpayers to subsidize exports by politically powerful American companies. The Ex-Im Bank embodies corporate welfare; it is a prime example of crony capitalism that has hurt economic growth.

Currently, the inside of your mailbox is legally the property of the U.S. Postal Service. This amendment would end the USPS monopoly on your mailbox, which means that other companies could provide the poorly-run USPS with competition in the delivery of first-class mail.

This amendment introduced by Sen. Rand Paul would have established a pilot program to allow alternative programs to compete with the U.S. Postal Service on a local level.

This is Senator Toomey's 2013 budget plan, which would balance the budget within eight years and save more than $5 trillion over the next ten years. It would also repeal ObamaCare, block grant Medicaid to the states, and cut individual and corporate taxes.

This is Senator Rand Paul's budget proposal for fiscal year 2013, which would balance the budget in five year and save over $8 trillion over ten years. This proposal, which closely resembles the one presented by the Tea Party Debt Commission in 2011, would also repeal ObamaCare, block grant Medicaid and other entitlement programs, and reform both Medicare and Social Security. It would also eliminate the Departments of Energy, Education, Housing and Urban Development, and Commerce, repeal Dodd-Frank, expand energy exploration, and privatize the TSA. In short, this is the single boldest and most effective free-market economic proposal to receive a vote in Congress.

This is Senator Mike Lee's budget proposal for fiscal year 2013, which would balance the budget in five years and would save $7 trillion over ten years. This bill also contains fundamental tax reform, with a single-rate flat tax for corporations and individuals. It also reforms Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, curbs regulations, and caps spending.

This resolution would have invoked the Congressional Review Act to stop the implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency's Utility MACT rule. Utility MACT is among the most devastating environmental regulations ever passed, as it would make it nearly impossible for new coal-fired power plants to be built and is already putting existing plants out of business. Making America's cheapest, most abundant energy resource difficult to use will greatly increase energy costs for all Americans, and during an economic downturn when they can least afford it.

This bill extends the farm subsidy and crop insurance programs, which are among the largest corporate welfare programs in the federal government. These subsidies largely go to well-connected large farm corporations and make it difficult for small family farms to compete in the marketplace. This bill also contains greatly expanded funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, better known as "food stamps". 80 percent of the "farm bill" actually goes towards funding the food stamp program, a widely-abused welfare program which should be voted on as as a standalone bill instead of being hidden in an unrelated bill.

This bill is the vehicle for the deal brokered by Senator McConnell and Vice President Biden to avert the "fiscal cliff". While it extends the 2001, 2003 and 2009 tax cuts and credits for most Americans, it allows them to expire on those earning over $450,000 per year. The bill also contains a $30 billion extension of unemployment benefits, and reauthorizes the 2008 Farm Bill for nine months. H.R. 8 allows the payroll tax holiday to expire, effectively raising taxes on 77% of taxpayers, yet extends dozens of tax credits and deductions that amount to corporate welfare for special interests. It also fails to extend the Bush-era tax cuts to all Americans, thus raising taxes at a time when economic growth is desperately needed.

This amendment would ensure that none of the funds made available under this Act may be used to administer or enforce the wage-rate requirements of the Davis-Bacon Act. Davis-Bacon is a leftover from the New Deal era which costs taxpayers billions of dollars each year because it requires government contractors to pay "local prevailing wages" for every project, which usually leads to expensive union labor receiving the contracts.

This amendment to S.223 would eliminate the Essential Air Service (EAS). The EAS was created in the 1970’s to help a small number of rural communities retain access to air service after airline deregulation. The needless program has continued for 23 years while costing taxpayers $200 million every year.

This amendment would completely strip the EPA of its ability to use the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases. The EPA has continually abused its authority under the Clean Air Act to promulgate ever more restrictive regulations on emissions, including designating carbon dioxide to be a “public danger”.

H.Con.Res.34 would balance the federal budget by 2040 without raising taxes, and would cut $6.2 trillion over the next decade compared to President Obama’s budget. The plan also reduces government spending to below 20 percent of the economy and block grants Medicaid to the states. While the "Ryan Plan" isn't ideal, it is at least a major step towards fiscal stability.

This is Senator Pat Toomey’s FY 2012 budget proposal, which would balance the entire federal budget within nine years without raising taxes. It reduces the publicly held debt to approximately 52 percent of GDP by 2021 and cuts spending to 18.5 percent of GDP. Unlike President Obama’s budget, it reforms entitlement programs by block granting Medicaid to individual states. The plan would save $7.1 trillion over the next decade.

This is Senator Rand Paul’s FY 2012 budget proposal, which would balance the federal budget in five years without raising taxes. It would result in a $19 billion surplus in the first year, without cutting Social Security, Medicare, or Veterans’ Affairs.

This is a vote on the "megabus" appropriations bill to authorize the government's spending through 2012. This bill authorizes over a trillion dollars in spending and was rushed through Congress without any time to examine what was in it.

This is the “Cut, Cap, and Balance Act of 2011”, which would cut total spending for FY2012 by $111 billion, cap total federal spending, and require the passage of a Balanced Budget Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that includes a super-majority requirement to raise taxes and a limit on spending before the debt limit can be raised.

The bill would grant President Obama the authority to raise the debt ceiling up to three times, with the caveat that these requests would be subject to a resolution of disapproval which could bar his request.

This amendment would limit spending under the federal highway funding bill to the amount deposited into the Highway Trust Fund via the federal gas tax. For many years, the federal government has spent more than the gas tax brings in, and has had to repeatedly bail out the Highway Trust Fund as a result.

This bill would prevent any projects in the 2011 budget from being required to comply with Davis-Bacon wage requirements. Davis-Bacon is a leftover from the New Deal era which costs taxpayers billions of dollars each year because it requires government contractors to pay "local prevailing wages" for every project, which usually leads to expensive union labor receiving the contracts.

This amendment would extend and modify the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program. TAA is a duplicative and inefficient program that spends millions of dollars to create training programs for workers who have supposedly lost their jobs due to free trade. The program operates on the false premise that free trade destroys jobs by shipping them overseas, when there is no data to support that fact.

This bill, the “Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act”, would impose sanctions on China for allegedly manipulating its currency. Retaliation aimed at the value of Chinese currency will not fix anything and could trigger a trade war. Placing high tariffs on Chinese goods acts as a tax on American consumers because the costs of the tariffs get passed down in the form of higher prices for imports.

This bill, the “American Jobs Act of 2011”, contains President Obama’s new stimulus plan to spend billions of dollars on infrastructure projects, raise income taxes, and extend unemployment benefits. These New Deal stimulus strategies only waste taxpayer dollars and do not contribute to economic growth.

The bill would ratify the United States-Korea Free Trade Agreement. Free trade is an indispensable part of free markets, the voluntary exchange of goods and services between consenting parties without government interference. Freer trade will allow Americans to reap the benefits of competition, which include more choices, better products, and lower prices.

This bill would ratify the United States-Panama Free Trade Agreement. Free trade is an indispensible part of free markets, the voluntary exchange of goods and services between consenting parties without government interference. Freer trade will allow Americans to reap the benefits of competition, which include more choices, better products, and lower prices.

This bill would ratify the United States-Columbia Free Trade Agreement. Free trade is an indispensible part of free markets, the voluntary exchange of goods and services between consenting parties without government interference. Freer trade will allow Americans to reap the benefits of competition, which include more choices, better products, and lower prices.

This amendment would extend the loan limits for several federal programs, including the Federal Housing Administration and the “government-sponsored enterprises” Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Given that poor lending practices by the likes of Fannie and Freddie were a primary cause of the financial crisis of 2008, extending their credit line is an inexcusable misallocation of taxpayer money.

The HIRE Act massively increases federal highway spending and other spending in order to supposedly stimulate the economy, operating under the Keynesian fallacy that a country can spend its way to prosperity. This bill will create few private sector jobs, while burdening our economy with still more deficit spending.

This resolution is the House "Rule" that would allow consideration of the "reconciliation" bill, H.R. 4872. The reconciliation bill would make the recently passed health care legislation even worse by enacting massive tax increases and creating still more new government bureaucracies in order to support it.

This is the vote on the final passage of ObamaCare. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act neither protects patients nor provides affordable care. It would kill jobs, drive up the price of health care, bankrupt the government, and ruin the world's best health care system. The bill also contains an unconstitutional individual mandate, which forces everyone to either purchase health care or pay a penalty, violating our individual liberty.

The reconciliation bill makes the terrible health care legislation recently enacted even worse with more job killing tax hikes, harsher penalties, and new government bureaucracies. This bill also builds a massive new student loan bureaucracy by essentially nationalizing the student loan industry.

This key vote is on the motion to concur in Senate amendments. The reconciliation bill makes the terrible health care legislation recently enacted even worse with more job killing tax hikes, harsher penalties, and new government bureaucracies. The reconciliation bill also builds a massive new student loan bureaucracy by nationalizing the student loan industry.

The American Workers, State, and Business Relief Act of 2010 contains several tax hikes that impose significant costs on businesses and threaten job creation. One undesirable tax increase included in the bill is the elimination of the punitive damages tax deduction. Another added tax increase is a new tax on carried interest.

The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act would impose new mandates, fees, and regulations on the nation's financial services sector and create a permanent $150 billion Wall Street bailout fund. Although it claims to prevent another financial meltdown like that of 2008, this bill actually institutionalizes the very financial practices and moral hazard that led to the crisi in the first place. It also creates a massive new regulatory apparatus with several agencies, such as the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), that have sweeping new powers but are generally unaccountable to Congress and the American public.

The Unemployment Compensation Extension Act of 2010 would extend unemployment benefits to November 30th for the long-term jobless. It would not boost job growth and it would add to our skyrocketing national debt.

This would make emergency supplemental appropriations for disaster relief and summer jobs for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2010, and for other purposes. This bill would add to our national debt.

This bill would further tax and impose harmful regulations on oil and gas producers and removes the legal liability cap for offshore operators.

This bill in its present form would authorize over $26 billion for an "education jobs fund", and would extend continue increased funding for the "Federal Medical Assistance Percentages" for Medicaid. The "pay-for" for this bill is a $9.6 billion tax increase, and even with the tax hike the bill would still add billions to our the nation's deficit spending.

The Small Business Lending Fund Act of 2010 would allocate $30 billion from the Troubled Asset Relief Program to a new fund for financial institutions with less than $10 billion in assets. The legislation would also create a new $2 billion federal program to encourage states to develop initiatives to increase access to capital for small businesses.

This bill is the vehicle for reauthorizing the Bush 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, which were set to expire at the end of 2010. However, the bill would allow the tax cuts to expire for the wealthiest tiers of income earners - a bad policy at any time, but even worse at a time when the economy is recovering from a recession. The bill would also reinstate the death tax. Soaking the rich will not fund our excessive government spending, and will further harm a precariously shaky economy.

H.R. 3082 would fund the government for the next ten months at current 2010 levels. With Congress failing to pass any of the required 12 annual appropriation bills, leaders have opted to put forth a massive $1.1 trillion continuing resolution that includes a number of costly provisions.

This spending bill would double authorized funding levels for scientific research agencies within ten years. Research and development are best left to the academy and the marketplace, instead of allowing the government to potentially use taxpayer dollars to favor research that suits a political agenda.

The FDA Food "Safety" Modernization Act would grant the federal government unprecedented control over our diets while not making our food any safer. The bill imposes new regulations upon farmers and other food producers and also requires the government to hire a troop thousands of new bureaucrats to enforce the new rules. They will be funded by "such sums as may be necessary." Besides wasting taxpayer dollars directly, the cost of producers complying with these new regulations will simply be passed onto consumers in the form of higher prices. Outbreaks of food-borne illnesses have decreased dramatically in frequency in recent decades, and there is simply no need for such an intrusive and expensive new set of regulations on food safety.

H.R. 3082 would fund the government for the next ten months at current 2010 levels. With Congress failing to pass any of the required 12 annual appropriation bills, leaders have opted to put forth a massive $1.1 trillion continuing resolution that includes a number of costly provisions.

This bill would amend Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to permit discrimination claims against employers well outside of the current statute of 180 days. This presents a radical departure from current anti-discrimination laws. Doing away with any practical statute of limitations, which has been considered a just practice in courts for centuries, opens the flood gates to a river of frivolous lawsuits.

The $700 billion in Wall Street bailout funds authorized by TARP was a bad policy in its own right, and the actual use of those funds has been even more troubling. The "TARP Reform and Accountability Act" fails to adequately protect these taxpayer funds or safeguard how they are being used. This motion to recommit would have stopped the unused $350 billion in TARP funding from being spent at all, and would have forced the Treasury Department to submit a repayment plan for those bailout funds which have already been spent.

This legislation calls for spending an additional $33 billion over the next five years to expand coverage under the S-CHIP program. At a time when our nation is facing record-breaking deficits in the trillions of dollars, expanding autopilot spending programs should not be on the agenda.

This bill would create $787 billion in new government spending on projects designed to stimulate an economic recovery. It is neither the government's role, nor is it within its ability, to spend the economy into prosperity. This stimulus package merely spends a fortune in taxpayers' hard-earned money to give away to whatever special interests are best able to claim that they can "create jobs".

This bill to fund the federal government contains a whopping 80 percent spending increase and is packed with earmarks and sweeping policy changes. Altogether, this omnibus bill increases government spending at more than double the rate of inflation and almost triple the rate of median growth in household incomes. With budget deficits already running at record highs, this bill just accelerates Washington's already out-of-control spending.

This legislation allows bankruptcy judges to modify home mortgages - including reducing principal - rather than leaving those business decisions in the hands of the banks and lenders who own the homes. The act modifies the Hope for Homeowners program by removing the taxpayer protections in place, making it easier for those who took mortgages they could not afford to receive a taxpayer-funded bailout.

This amendment sought to remove all Davis-Bacon prevailing wage provisions from the 2009 water resources bill. Davis-Bacon is a leftover from the New Deal era which costs taxpayers billions of dollars each year because it requires government contractors to pay "local prevailing wages" for every project, which really means letting expensive union labor receive the contracts regardless of other competition.

Their budget taxes too much, spends too much, and borrows too much. And, potentially worst of all, it would open the door for socialized medicine and a massive energy tax to be enacted later this year without substantial debate through the reconciliation process.

The bill includes a $100 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout. The bill contains funding for other projects that should not be used as a vehicle to ram IMF funding through Congress. Using this method to get the IMF funding passed is dirty Washington politics and law makers should reject it.

This legislation marks a radical increase in power for the Food and Drug Administration over the tobacco industry, and another attempt by a parental government to make citizens' health choices for them.

The bill includes a $100 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout. The bill contains funding for other projects that should not be used as a vehicle to ram IMF funding through Congress. Using this method to get the IMF funding passed is dirty Washington politics and law makers should reject it.

The Waxman-Markey energy bill calls for a “cap-and-trade” system for the regulation of greenhouse gases, and is, in essence, a massive tax on all energy use. The resulting spike in energy costs would devastate the economy across the board, and would particularly harm lower-income individuals, who would have even less money to spend on steadily rising electric and heating bills.

This bill introduces federal control of employee compensation to a degree that is both constitutionally questionable and has no place in a market economy. Perhaps most startling about this bill is that the new mandates it establishes on the private sector are so broad and ill-defined that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is unable to determine just how much these rules will cost the economy, making it impossible to conduct a cost-benefit analysis.

The bill would essentially provide an endless line of credit to college students, as well as greatly increasing the amount given out through Pell Grants. Guaranteeing students access to free, easy loans on grants will encourage them to take on more debt that they cannot afford, while colleges will continue to raise their tuition to match the flow of government money. This bill further expands the massive student loan debt bubble, which - like the housing bubble before it - will eventually burst.

(Note: this was the original version of ObamaCare, later passed as H.R. 3590.) This comprehensive government takeover of health care saddles hundreds of billions of dollars in new taxes upon the American people. The bill contains an unconstitutional individual mandate forcing people to buy health insurance simply because they exist. Instead of making health care more affordable, this bill's mandates and regulations will massively increase the cost of everyone's health insurance and reduce the quality of care over time.

This bill contains the "doc fix" that Congress passes annually in order to keep Medicare payments to doctors from sharply decreasing. While the doc fix may be necessary in order to keep doctors from opting out of seeing Medicare patients, this bill would cost $200 billion over ten years, with no spending reforms to offset its huge expense. Separating this bill from the main comprehensive health care reform bill is thus a fundamentally dishonest attempt to hide the true costs of the massive health care takeover being discussed in Congress, and to kick the problem of Medicare reform down the road yet again.

While this bill claims to enact "permanent estate tax relief", the legislation puts in place a permanent 45 percent tax on estates over $3.5 million. A 45 percent tax is a dramatic tax increase over the zero percent death tax that will be in place in 2010, when death is scheduled to no longer be a taxable event.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2010, or so-called “minibus” would combine six of the seven remaining appropriations bills to fund nine Cabinet departments to the tune of $447 billion and $600 billion in funding for Medicare and Medicaid for a total of $1.1 trillion; a 13% increase over FY 2009 and a 25% increase over FY 2008.

This motion to recommit would have amended the Dodd-Frank bill to fully repeal the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), and to reduce the national debt limit by an amount corresponding to the hundreds of billions that would be saved by TARP's repeal.

The "Dodd-Frank" bill not only fails in its stated goal of reining in the risky lending that led to the current fiscal crisis, it actually institutionalizes the practice of bailing out banks deemed to be "too big to fail". By telling Wall Street banks that irresponsible lending will be rewarded by government bailouts, this bill almost guarantees another financial bubble and collapse in the future.

This bill would increase regulations on energy and subsidize renewable energy. This would raise the cost of energy production, causing home energy bills and the price of gas at the pump to rise.

This motion, by Speaker Pelosi, would kill the Columbia Free Trade Agreement. Free trade encourages both imports and exports between countries, and creates wealth and jobs on both sides of the agreement.

The bill, which provides $15 billion in loans and grants to states and cities to buy foreclosed properties, is a prime example of out-of-control government spending that would do little to address the underlying problems in the housing sector.

This amendment would impose a so-called "Patriot Tax" on upper income brackets. Raising taxes upon these high income brackets does great harm to the small business owners who are the engine for growth in America's economy.

This is the budget resolution for fiscal year 2009 that will skyrocket the national debt.

The bill, a shallow attempt to rein in gas prices, is eerily reminiscent of the very policies that led to shortages and gas lines in the 1970s and early 1980s. It would over-regulate energy prices and prevent free market allocation.

This spending bill would raise taxes and increase the national debt.

This bill's real purpose, while purporting to protect wildlife and natural scenery, is to prevent the installation of an efficient and environmentally beneficial natural gas terminal. This bill only hinders energy production and economic progress.

This bill creates more government interference in energy markets, essentially imposing a "use it or lose it" rule upon oil lands. This rule would make it nearly impossible for many oil-rich areas to be developed, which merely harms consumers and prevents the creation of jobs.

This is the final vote on the bill that provided a massive (up to $300 billion) bailout to the "Government Sponsored Entities" Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. These two GSEs were in danger of bankruptcy because of their irresponsibly loose lending practices, and they should have been allowed to go bankrupt instead of putting taxpayers on the hook for their misbehavior. In addition, the bill contains an $800 billion increase in the debt ceiling.

The House bill includes language that allows the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to impose new "user fees" to cover the costs of its expanded regulatory program. The user fee would no longer be a "fee for service' that covers the agency’s costs—it would be a new tax.

H.R. 6604 is a premature action by Congress to pin the current energy problem on commodities future traders rather than address the real problem of supply. The consequences of the legislation are greater intervention in markets and an expansion of government into the reach of private contracts.

This bill is a vehicle for the massive government bank bailout, including the Troubled Assets Relief Program (T.A.R.P.). Bailing out banks that have made bad investments distorts the free market by creating a 'moral hazard'. If banks know that the government will bail them out of their bad decisions just because they are "too big to fail", they have no incentive to make wise investment decisions. FreedomWorks has double-weighted votes against this bill.

This bill would provide a $700 billion bailout for the financial industry. FreedomWorks strongly opposes this bill because it rewards those institutions which caused the financial collapse in the first place by making reckless loans. Bailing them out creates the moral hazard that these banks and lenders will recognize that they can continue to make risky loans without fear of consequences as long as they are "too big to fail".

This legislation would provide $14 billion in taxpayer loans to eligible U.S. automakers. Like T.A.R.P., this bailout would create moral hazard for the failing car companies. This bill picks winners and losers, while the market should be allowed to adjust to changes.

This is the "Card Check Bill," which will make it easier for unions to unionize workers in the private sector. It will eliminate most of the secrecy in union balloting, allowing union intimidation of workers.

This bill would amend the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934 to force shareholder review of executive compensation, which would open the door for increased federal intrusion into the private sector. Although transparency in executive compensation is necessary, many shareholders already have this privilege under their company’s bylaws.

This legislation would make it a federal crime to sell crude oil, gas, natural gas or petroleum at a price that is “unconscionably excessive” or “takes unfair advantage” of unordinary market conditions. This legislation mandates severe fines for any violations including market manipulation, false price reporting and unconscionable prices.

This $607 million spending bill will end up costing $152 million in 2008 thus exceeding the president’s budget by more than $10 million. In addition, it would spend $7 million more than the current levels and more than $2.3 million more than the Senate version. In addition to exceeding the budget, this bill is also loaded with pork projects and represents the out of control spending going on in Congress.

Funded by a $0.45 increase in the federal cigarette excise tax and a nearly 200% raise in taxes on cigars, the SCHIP reauthorization proposal calls for up to $50 billion in new funds for the program, dwarfing the President’s current request of $5 billion over 5 years. In addition to greatly expanding a program that was originally designed to be a limited contribution to State health services, this bill would be a giant step toward government controlled health care.

This bill would authorize over $43 billion over 3 years to fund at least 40 new federal programs for various agencies including the National Science Foundation, National Institute of Science and Technology, and the Departments of Commerce, Education and Energy. The size and scope of the funding that emerged from the conference report drastically exceeds the original House version where $23 billion was allocated for 20 new programs. It not only represents the reckless spending that has come to characterize Congress, but also is a drastic and irresponsible expansion of the size of government.

This amendment to the “New Direction for Energy Independence, National Security, and Consumer Protection Act” would create a mandate requiring the use of renewable portfolio standard for generating electricity starting in 2010 with the goal of forcing electric utilities to produce 20 percent of their energy from renewable sources by 2020. Energy providers who did not comply would be penalized by being forced to purchase renewable energy from other generators in the form of utility credits or pay the difference to the federal government.

The bill would hit our energy suppliers with billions of dollars in new taxes. New taxes on oil and its providers will only lead to increased cost of production which will be passed onto consumers in the form of higher prices on gas, natural gas and electric utilities. Even though alternative energy holds promise for the future, federal mandates and taxes will not make the technology viable any faster. All that this bill will do is increase taxes and the price of fuel for the consumer.

This legislation calls for spending $33 billion over the next five years to expand coverage of the S-CHIP program. S-CHIP would be a massive increase in health care entitlements, and only exacerbates the underlying problem of increasing health care costs and reliance upon third-party payers in health care. It will also cost tens of billions of dollars at a time when the government is already incurring massive, unsustainable deficits. The bill, as passed, would vastly expand government controlled health care coverage to cover individuals up to 300% above the poverty line.

This legislation would add layers of bureaucracy to a situation already bogged down in government regulations and mismanagement. Not only does the act duplicate the efforts of the existing HUD department, at the same time the trust would compete with HUD for already limited funds. Whereas the government needs to be streamlining and modernizing a department, H.R. 2895 creates an increasingly complex web of uncertain funding and extraneous administration, making this act, in essence, the appendix of the housing conundrum.

This bill calls for $50 billion in new funding for the program that far exceeds the $5 billion requested by the President. In addition to greatly expanding a program that was originally designed to be a limited contribution to State health services, this bill would be a giant step toward government controlled health care.

This bill would provide a process for the reorganization of a Native Hawaiian governing body and reaffirm the “special political and legal relationship between the United States” and the governing body. According to the Supreme Court’s ruling in the 2000 case of Rice v. Cayetano, any preferential treatment that the native Hawaiian population enjoys runs contrary to the 15th Amendment’s protection against racial discrimination.

This bill calls for $50 billion in new funding for the program that far exceeds the $5 billion requested by the President. In addition to greatly expanding a program that was originally designed to be a limited contribution to State health services, this bill would be a giant step toward government controlled health care.

This bill would permanently ban taxation of the Internet, which would encourage the free dissemination of technology and information. If the Internet were allowed to be taxed, then it could also be regulated. This would result not only in an additional tax on consumers, businesses, and schools, but also could open the door to censorship.

This water projects bill is bloated with over 900 special-interest earmarks, which far exceeds the $4.9 billion requested by the Army Corps of Engineers. The bill does not set any priorities and would result in funding for truly essential projects, like protections in Louisiana against future hurricanes, being drowned out in a sea of pork.

This amendment would reduce tariffs for 80% of U.S. consumer and industrial exports to Peru and would phase out the remaining tariffs over the next ten years. Free trade not only drives the efficiency of the global economy, but is also essential to the freedom of American citizens to buy and sell legal goods without government interference.

While providing tax relief for some, this bill contains a tax increase on carried interest and private equity, expatriates, and deferred compensation. Additionally, H.R. 3996 would delay another tax cut for 8 years, which essentially amounts to a tax increase.

This bill imposes unnecessary regulations and exposes lenders to increased liability, which will have the net effect of making mortgage loans harder to get for many Americans. Although mortgage reform is necessary, H.R. 3915 fails to set clear guidelines for lending companies and opens the door for lawsuit abuse.

This bill contains more than 8,000 earmarks for special-interest projects. In addition to the large amount of earmarks, the bill also contains several budget gimmicks designed to hide the addition $14 billion in unnecessary Congressional spending.

This amendment prohibits any of the funds made available in the Act from being used to fund dairy education in Iowa. There is no reason that taxpayers should be forced to subsidize dairy education.

An amendment to prohibit use of funds in the bill for the National Grape and Wine Initiative. This project is unnecessary should not require taxpayer funds.

The American Made Energy and Good Jobs Act would privately develop domestic oil reserves. This is a critical step in the long term strategy of reducing American dependence on foreign sources of energy and of developing low-cost energy in this country.

Amendment sought to add a new section to Title VII of the Communication Act of 1934 entitled "Network Neutrality". Network neutrality would hurt Internet innovation.

An amendment to prohibit the use of funds from being used to renovate a city-owned pool in Banning, California. This is an unnecessary overreach of federal spending.

An amendment to prohibit any of the funds in the bill from being used for the Institute for Exploration at Mystic Aquarium in New London, Connecticut. This is an unnecessary program that the federal government should not be involved in.

H.R. 4890 would give the President the authority to isolate unnecessary or wasteful spending provisions in bills that have passed Congress and send these specific line items back to Congress for a timely up-or-down vote. This would allow for greater control over spending.

H.R. 4761 would increase oil exploration in the United States through reducing overbearing regulations.

This legislation moves the United States closer to the goal of creating a region-wide Middle East free trade area by 2013. An agreement with Oman would mark the fifth such nation in the Middle East with open trade ties to the United States. Free trade agreements allow Americans to buy and sell goods in more markets.

This resolution would make it more difficult to pass earmarks, a necessary step in controlling spending.

This would allow greater and fairer access to Federal courts by those who assert Federal property rights claims under the Fifth Amendment's Takings Clause. Protecting private property allows for greater economic development.

This is a $295 billion transportation bill which is more than $11 billion larger than the agreed upon allotment for transportation. In addition, it contains literally thousands of wasteful earmarks.

The amendment would reduces spending by 2% compared to last year's level (the Budget Committee calls for a .7% reduction), which is over $5.1 billion more in first-year savings than the Committee's bill. It includes reconciliation instructions reducing the rate of growth of mandatory spending from 6.4% to 6.1%.

This bill would make the repeal of the death tax permanent. The death tax is a massive double tax on business capital vital to increased productivity and job creation.

This resolution would have rejected American membership in the World Trade Organization, threatening international free trade. Free trade is beneficial to the productivity of all nations.

This bill fails to bring the market discipline the postal system needs and acts as yet another taxpayer bailout of the Postal Service. The US Postal Service desperately needs reform, but H.R. 22 is not reform.

This would ratify the Dominican Republic-Central America-United States Free Trade Agreement. Free trade opens the economy to new and cheaper goods.

This is a $295 billion transportation bill which is more than $11 billion larger than the agreed upon allotment for transportation. In addition, it contains literally thousands of wasteful earmarks.

This would grant further Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for Hurricane Katrina relief. This spending would add to the national debt.

The bill addresses many of the problems of government overreach in the Endangered Species Act and strengthens the protection of private property rights.

This bill would expedite the construction of new refining capacity in the United States and reduce many burdensome environmental regulations.

This bill prevents frivolous lawsuits against food and soft drink distributors, a step forward in reforming America’s dysfunctional tort system.

This bill would improve attorney accountability and reduce frivolous lawsuits. This would promote a more stable legal environment.

H.R. 1606 would amend the Federal Election Campaign Act to exclude Internet communications from the Act’s definition of “public communication.” The bill is commonly regarded as the “blogger protection” bill since it addresses concerns that bloggers who regularly engage in mass public communications will become subject to federal campaign finance regulations—- especially if they reference a federal candidate 30 days before a primary election or 60 days before a general election. Of course, all restrictions on speech content offend the Constitution, but protecting bloggers will be a good first step.

This bill would curb eminent domain abuse by withholding federal economic development funds from states and localities that engage in eminent domain abuse. Limiting the government's ability to enforce eminent domain will protect private property from government overreach.

This bill would save taxpayers $50 billion over the next five years. This is not an enormous cut but a good first step to long-term debt reduction.

This legislation would extend the pro-growth reductions to capital gains and dividend tax rates that have helped to grow the economy.